What Can You Do With Clay In Animal Crossing?
Animal Crossing is a popular life simulation video game where players control a customizable character living in a village inhabited by anthropomorphic animals. The gameplay focuses on activities like fishing, bug catching, fossil hunting, gardening, decorating your home, and interacting with the animal villagers. One of the many items you can find and use in Animal Crossing is clay.
Clay is a soft, malleable material made from earth that can be molded into various shapes and forms. In Animal Crossing, clay is a natural material you can dig up around your village. It has a variety of uses for crafting furniture, creating pottery, and customizing or improving your island. With clay, you can let your creativity run wild in designing and decorating your character’s house, island layout, and the villagers’ homes.
Finding Clay
Clay is a handy crafting material in Animal Crossing: New Horizons that allows you to create pottery, furniture, and other decorative items. Unlike some crafting materials that must be purchased, clay can be gathered for free from certain locations on your island.
Clay deposits can be found along riverbanks and cliff edges on your island. Check along the sides of rivers and the base of cliffs to spot these tan clay deposits. Use your shovel to hit the deposit and dig up clay chunks. Each deposit will release 4 clay pieces so you can gather a good amount from each one.
Keep an eye out for thin cracks in the ground as these often indicate a clay deposit underneath. Also, hitting rocks with an axe sometimes causes small clay pieces to pop out. Exploring your whole island is the best way to locate all the clay available.
Crafting with Clay
One of the most common uses for clay in Animal Crossing is crafting various DIY recipes. Clay is a required ingredient for making a variety of furniture items, household goods, and decorative objects. Here are some of the many DIY recipes that use clay:
Clay Furniture:
- Brick oven
- Clay furnace
- Firewood
- Hearth
- Outdoor bath
- Pond stone
- Stone lion-dog
- Stone stool
- Stone table
- Stone tile
- Succulent plant
- Zen-style stone
Household Items:
- Birdbath
- Bonfire
- Brick fence
- Brick oven
- Brick well
- Clothesline pole
- Destinations signpost
- Firewood
- Fountain
- Outdoor bath
- Outdoor picnic set
- Stone arch
- Stone tablet
- Stone tile
- Traditional tea set
Decorative Objects:
- Birdbath
- Bonfire
- Brick oven
- Brick well
- Clay furnace
- Firewood
- Fountain
- Hearth
- Outdoor bath
- Outdoor picnic set
- Pond stone
- Stone arch
- Stone lion-dog
- Stone stool
- Stone tablet
- Stone tile
- Succulent plant
- Traditional tea set
- Zen-style stone
Clay Furniture
One of the best uses for clay in Animal Crossing is to craft a variety of furniture items to decorate your island. Clay is used to make pottery items like jars, bowls, mugs, and vases in classic terra cotta colors. Some of the top clay furniture items include:
- Birdbath – This beautiful birdbath crafted from clay attracts birds to your island.
- Brick oven – Use this oven made of bricks and clay to cook recipes in style.
- Empty can – Crafted from clay, this empty can decor item has a charming rustic look.
- High-end stereo – This retro-inspired stereo made of clay plays your favorite K.K. Slider tunes.
- Mini DIY workbench – This diminutive workbench made of clay is perfect for any room.
- Outdoor bath – Relax in this serene outdoor clay tub placed in your zen garden.
- Traditional tea set – Brew customized teasets made of clay for having guests over.
The natural look and feel of clay furniture fits right in with island decor. Place clay items both inside your home and outdoors to add an earthy vibe. Customize the color of clay furniture to match different room themes using Customization Kits.
Creating Pottery
One of the most popular uses of clay in Animal Crossing is creating pottery items using the pottery wheel. Once you obtain the DIY recipe for the pottery wheel, you can begin crafting various types of decorative clay pots, vases, bowls, and more.
To craft pottery, first place the pottery wheel furniture item in your home or island. Interact with it while having some clay in your inventory to access the pottery crafting menu. Here you can select which type of pottery item you want to create.
The pottery wheel allows you to craft and customize a variety of decorative clay items to decorate your home. Some of the most popular pottery items include the botamochi, ceramic vase, coffee cup, mug, pot, and more. You can craft these in different customized versions and glazes.
Crafting pottery takes time as your character will physically sit at the wheel and sculpt each item. But it provides a fun and satisfying way to put your island’s clay resources to good decorative use.
Customizing Clay Items
One of the best things about clay items in Animal Crossing is that many of them can be customized with different colors and patterns. This allows you to really personalize your clay furniture, floors, walls, and other items.
To customize a clay item, you’ll first need to craft or purchase it. Then take it to a DIY Workbench while having Customization Kits in your inventory. Select “Customize Item” and you’ll be shown a menu with different customization options.
For example, the Brick Oven can be customized to have a white, red, or green exterior. The Birdbath can have different color stone bases. Flooring like the White Brick Flooring can be customized to completely change the tile color and pattern.
Get creative and match your custom clay items to your house’s interior design and furniture. Or if crafting items as gifts, you can customize them to your friend’s style. Changing up the look of basic clay items is a great way to add a unique touch to your island.
Just remember that each customization requires 1 Customization Kit. These can be purchased from Nook’s Cranny or obtained by shooting down balloons. So customize wisely and make the most of your clay creations!
Clay’s Bell Value
One of the main uses for clay in Animal Crossing is to sell it for Bells. Bells are the primary currency in the Animal Crossing games, and collecting and selling items like clay is a great way to earn Bells.
At Nook’s Cranny, the main store in the game, clay sells for a base price of 300 Bells per clay. This makes clay a decent mid-tier material for earning Bells – it sells for more than common materials like tree branches, but less than rarer materials like gold nuggets.
The sell price for clay can also be increased if the player implements the Bell Boom ordinance in their island. This ordinance increases the sell price of all items by 20%. With Bell Boom enacted, clay will sell for 360 Bells per piece.
Clay is readily available on most islands and can be gathered in large quantities fairly easily. It respawns every day, providing a reliable source of income. For players looking to expand their house upgrades, build infrastructure, pay off loans, or simply earn Bells for purchasing items, clay is a useful material to collect and sell at Nook’s Cranny.
Uses in Construction
Clay is an extremely versatile material that has been used in construction for thousands of years. In Animal Crossing, clay can be used as a building material for various infrastructure projects on your island.
Due to its moldability, durability, and water resistance, clay is great for constructing bridges, inclines, dams, canals, and other structures exposed to the elements. Clay can be formed into bricks which are then used to build ramps, staircases, and cliffsides. Structures made from clay bricks are attractive, rustic, and blend in well with the natural island landscape.
Clay’s earthy tones and texture allows it to complement other common construction materials like stone and wood. Mixing clay bricks with these materials creates a cohesive aesthetic for infrastructure across your island. Clay is also easy to mine and refine into construction materials right on your own island.
Overall, clay is an ideal material for building and shaping sturdy infrastructure projects in Animal Crossing. Its versatility and aesthetic make it a go-to construction material for enhancing your island in a practical yet visually appealing way.
Clay in Custom Designs
Clay can be a useful material when creating custom designs in Animal Crossing. Custom designs allow players to make personalized paths, art, clothing, wallpapers, and more. Clay’s earthy brown color can serve as a nice neutral base for many custom designs.
For example, clay paths made with custom designs can give a more natural, dirt road look compared to the standard cobblestone or brick paths. Clay paths can wind through flower gardens, lead to villager homes, connect areas on your island, and more. Experiment with different custom designs on top of the clay paths to create variation.
Clay can also be used when making custom artwork around your island. For instance, you can create custom clay tiles or bricks to make patios, courtyards, mosaics, and other decorative ground pieces. Clay provides a subdued base color for the artwork to stand out.
Overall, clay is a versatile design element. Use it to craft earthy paths, paint custom ground art, and design spaces with a natural look and feel.
Conclusion
In summary, clay is an incredibly useful natural material in Animal Crossing. While initially appearing to just be a basic item used for crafting, clay has many applications across furniture, construction, customization, and more in the game.
Some of the most common uses for clay include crafting clay furniture like the brick oven, creating potted plants, customizing items to give them a clay look, and using clay in construction of fences, walls, floors and infrastructure for your island. Clay can also be used decoratively in custom designs.
Beyond its functionality, clay also has solid value at around 300 bells per piece sold. It provides good income early on when resources are scarce. The ability to dig up clay across the island makes it readily available at all stages of the game too.
Overall, clay is one of the most versatile and valuable natural materials in Animal Crossing. Its prevalence across crafting, customization, construction and selling makes it a core item for any player’s daily activities and progression in their island development.
