Pottery made to order | repair and restoration studio in Southern Delaware

Hiding Repair Lines When Repairing Broken Ceramic or Pottery Seamlessly

How to Achieve a Seamless Invisible Repair?

Many customers believe that if the broken item has a "clean break" and that there are no missing pieces, the repair lines will not be visible by just cementing the broken pieces together. In fact, once the pieces are cemented, the repair lines will be wider because the adhesive takes some space increasing the gap and therefore the repair lines will appear darker. To hide the break lines and the fillers, we start with airbrushing matching colors to the background that hide colors or painted details in the break lines' immediate areas and some details are erased. These details need to be painted over the background color, thus, the more details the vessel has, the longer the effort.


Complete Pottery Repair Quick Video (Click to full version - 22 min)


The key to proper repair is illustrated below in two examples.
A) Break lines do not go through too many surface decoration details and
B) Break lines go through intricately painted details.

As you will learn from the second example below, the amount of details we have to restore and the involved process required for a good repair will have a direct impact on repair duration and, therefore, cost.


Case 1: Hiding Repair Lines With Simple Glaze


Surface with repair line ready for painting


Clay color airbrushed over repair line


Turquoise elements painted with airbrush


Green elements painted with airbrush

Repair line invisible
Gray elements painted with airbrush

Seamlesss repair
Repaired areas after matte glaze - ready!



Case 2: Hiding Break Lines With Painted Glaze Details


Broken ceramic lamp


11 broken segments


Repair lines visible after cementing


Repair are missing more details after insuring smooth and continuous surface


Clean surfaces, protect undamaged paintings with latex and air brush clay color to hide worked areas. Cure at 160 degrees.


Airbrush background colors and shades of colors (4-6 layers). Cure at 160 degrees.


Hand paint all missing details including gold. Cure at 160 degrees and apply cold glaze with the proper matching sheen


Remove protective latex - pull at 90 degrees angle to insure fresh paint does not pull


Air brush glaze with slight texture to insure proper bond of the next hand painting step. Cure at 160 degrees for 36 hours.


Lamp complete


Lamp complete - ready for assembly


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