Hello all,

During the last couple of months I have seen website articles on fan-made Horadric Cubes.

Since I've made several of these things myself, I decided to make a Horadric Cube.

I think what I achieved is much closer to the original cube than many of the others made before.
It was also cheap and relatively easy. It would make a great Christmas gift!

This is a "How-To" make one of these.

You don't have to be used to working with clay to make anything less awesome.

Step 1: Grabbing Materials

Grab your materials! Brown + Gold Sculpey Clay, a ruler, a rolling pin (I used a Starbucks cup instead) and as thin of a knife as you can get. Note: to make the Transmute button I make in this, you have to use a tiny amount of White clay as well. You don't have to, but keep that in mind while shopping.

If you can get a rolling pin, use it. It's better and ensures that your clay is the same thickness when you roll it. Anything else makes it uneven, and thus less cube-ish.

(Buy Sculpey Clay at any arts + crafts store like Michael's. It's cheap, comes in a variety of colors. There are several other brands that work JUST FINE such as Fimo.)

This clay sticks to anything really easily, so if you can find a marble or glass surface, use that. I have none, so you can put Aluminum foil over a clipboard or something and work on that. (It sometimes tears, but it's k.)

Step 2: Rolling the Sides Out.

Use your rolling pin to roll your brown fimo clay to a long pancake. It should be about 3/16 of an inch thick when you're done. To check, just take it off the foil and measure with your ruler.
Try to get your fingers underneath the edge of the clay and it comes off easily.

Step 3: Cutting the Sides

From the bottom of your pancake, measure a 1.5" square. Your pancake should be long enough for like 3 total before you have to roll it up into a ball again.

Roll it into a ball, and roll it out again, until it is around the same thickness.
You should get it high enough for 2 squares. Then, roll it out one last time to get the last square.

Stack the squares on top of each other as you're making em'.
Now that you have 6 squares, you're done with the brown clay completely!
I usually have a tiny ball left over of the clay. Keep it for later in case you mess up with something.

Step 4: Making the Box.

Time to work with the gold clay now! roll it out until it's about 3/16th of an inch again.
Then, make as large of a rectangle as you can make.

Use your ruler to measure 3/16 of an inch wide strips, and cut them out. Make about five. Side by side.

Your cube is really going to start to come together now. Place one square on your surface and line it with your gold strips. You should use about two of your strips to line the entire cube.

Okay, now grab your brown squares. We're gonna use em' now.
Place them vertically, and parallel to the bottom square, making a box.

Should your squares be not thick enough, or too thick, place them closer to the center of the box so no gold shows.
If it's really, really thick I suppose you could always roll out a new one with your clay.

When you're done, it should look like this: (pic 3)

The remaining gold strips you have will become the corners of your box. Cut out like 1.5 inch long strips, and then place them alongside the corners, then cut off the excess that is longer than the top of your box.

As for myself, I fail at perfection though I'm a perfectionist. So if your strips don't fit right, chances are they're too thick.
Use your thin knife to trim off as much as you need.
Or, try squeezing your strip carefully to make it thinner.

So, now that you have all the corners done, YOU HAVE A BOX! Pat yourself on the back and stuff.

Now let's make it a Horadric Cube.

Step 5: Make Loops.

These next few steps won't really be hard, but rather tedious since the Horadric Cube has to have every side the same. Add one thing, and then you have to do it six times.

(Should you have the cover put on top of the box, take it off unless you want it to be a closed box forever.)

Make about 12 4.5 inch long, really thin strips. Use the pictures here to determine how thin, I didn't measure. Just grab a hunk of clay and roll it around. Once it's 4.5" long, connect the ends, and make a loop. Place them like the picture above.

The sides should be wider than the tips, like a weird oval.

Then, use another loop from your strips to do that to the opposite end.

Step 6: Repeat.

Repeat on all six sides. If you actually made your 12 4.5" long strips, you should have all you need. Start connecting the ends and roll em' out.

This is what you cube should look like, compared to the end product. You can stop now if you like, I think that this result still looks rather decent. Proceed to the last step for cooking instructions. (You bake it to harden)

Step 7: Continuing the Design.

Wow, going all the way huh? Gratz! These next few steps once again aren't really hard, just repetitive.

Make around 6 sets of 12 tiny balls. To prevent myself from going crazy making them, I usually only make two sets then apply then to the cube so I can have satisfaction of seeing a side or so completely finished.

Once you make a set, place them like so: ( pic 1)

The balls to the left are situated to mimic where I place them on the cube. 4 in the center, and 2 on each corner. (12)

Then, using your fingers, pinch the ball until it makes a triangle. Try not to make it too thick. Do that for every single ball until it looks like the set on the right of the picture above.
The ones on the corners should be more like hooks than triangles, think a pirate's hook when pinching em'.

Place the 4 triangle pieces on the center. Place them on the middle part of that side, then push down. Use your knife to smooth the edges to combine with the loop you made.

Now place the hooks on the corners. Make it so they converge into each other to form a tiny circle.
Once again, push, down, use your knife to shape it just right, then smooth with the knife.

Now, finish for all the corners and your side should be done!

Step 8: Repeat.

Take a deep breath, maybe a break too, and repeat for all sides, until you have this!

(Note: If you have to have a side you completed pressing against the surface, as long as you don't push too hard, it shouldn't mess it up.)

Step 9: Transmute Button! (Optional)

The most important part! (To me) It doesn't matter how big it is, but I like to make it about 5/16 of an inch long, square.

Use the gold clay to make that. I have white clay for the symbls, but use your leftover Brown clay if you so choose.
(Or, you could have a brown button and gold symbols, but then the button won't show up well.)

Basically just flatten out a tiny piece of clay, and then cut out a heart. Put it on the top left. Then, make a little rectangle and put it on the bottom right, with a tiny ball of clay on top of it to make it look like a bottle.

Roll out a 5/16 inch long clay strip, and weave it so it "connects" the heart and the bottle.
Grab a tiny ball of clay and make a tiny triangle using your fingers.
Press that onto the end of the strip so it points to the bottle, and you're done! Press the button wherever you want it.

Step 10: Baking (NOT OPTIONAL!)

Grab a typical cookie sheet and place aluminum foil on it. Set your oven to 270 degrees. Once it's ready, place the box on the foil, open side up. Take your cover off of your box and place it far away from the box, or else your cube will be completely sealed, or stuck to one end. (Unless you want that..)

(Note: Polymer clay has unhealthy odors when baking. Crack a window while baking and don't try sniffing your cube, haha.)

Take a large, flat object such as a box or a book and press down gently on the box, to make sure it'll be flat and not wobble.
Once it looks good, place it in the oven.

Set the timer for 10 minutes and after that just poke the cube with an oven mitt so its on another side. Push down the cover in case it rises up a little so it's still flat.

Put it in the oven for 10 more minutes, and rotate the cube again again, and put it in for 10 more minutes.

Now it's been 30 minutes! Take your cube out. The cover should be completely hardened, but maybe a TINY bit squishy. The box itself should be able to squish a little bit, but more resistant than before.

Leave them to cool for 15 minutes, and you'll find it super hard when you're done.

Step 11: Enjoy!

You're ready for Diablo III for sur nao!

(I bought these bottles at Michael's with my clay for a dollar each and filled them with water + food coloring to look like potions.)