Lemon and lapis

Tags

animals, art, blue, crafts, Delft, dollhouse, English, flooring, French, French kitchen, miniature, tile, Undersized urbanite, yellow

With a quickly approaching contest deadline, I decided I needed more tedium and selected tile for the kitchen. I originally had the idea because of travels in Spain. You could walk into little shops in Andalucía overflowing with colorful pottery and tile, just waiting to adorn a home. France had also picked up on the idea (just look at Monet’s kitchen in Giverny). Even in medieval times, tile floors were a sight to behold, full of color and pattern, and sometimes each one was different. My little baker would have carved out what space he could for his French kitchen, and there is just something magical about deep blues and cheerful yellows.

Spoilers…

In a feeble attempt to maintain sanity, I decided to make most of the tiles larger and one color, with smaller, detailed ones as accent pieces. When I learned of a pattern called “windmill,” I had to try it in my mill cottage. I wanted this to be the kind of floor people would stop and look at if they had walked into the room and had time to stand idly.  But first I had to make the miniature tiles…on top of real tiles, of course.

In learning the paint was fairly translucent, I chose to make the tiles out of white Sculpey, cut into 5mm and 11mm squares. (Another huge thank you to my friends for letting me kidnap their pasta roller!) The tiles got a basecoat of white and a sanding before the magic began.

I wanted these to be like Delft tiles, and in researching them I found animals, plants, and natural scenes to be common themes.  I did make one obligatory Dutch windmill tile, along with all manner of real and imaginary creatures of the earth, land, and sea. I was at the coast when I did these, and I added dolphins to the mix after watching a pair hunting for fish in the shallows.  I also added some classic French and English symbols (including a more contemporary blue and white British icon *wink*, see if you can find it).  The best tiles made the cut, and each is unique.

I used Pebeo’s Porcelaine 150 paints, and Pebeo is quickly becoming my favorite art supply company (a position previously held by GOLDEN for its gesso and Derwent for its watercolor pencils). Their Setasilk paints for silk painting are wonderfully easy to use, and their Porcelaine paints are even more impressive. They are water-based but take on a permanent, glossy finish when baked at 300°F for 30 minutes. People typically use them to personalize ceramics (mugs, plates, etc.), but I wanted to try them out as “ultra-low-fire” glazes for miniature pottery. I hope to throw some tiny pieces for this house (far, far down the road), but had been balking at the idea of using real glazes until I found these paints. I don’t think anyone has used these paints for this purpose, so it’s been an experiment.

A very colorful experiment.

I glued down the tiles before applying “grout,” which was the same wood filler I had used for the brick mortar, just applied straight from the tube this time. Since the paint is waterproof once cured, I was able to apply grout just like real tile: slather it on and wipe it off with a damp towel.

How did I grout the archway you ask? Tape, lots and lots of tape. Masking tape is the unsung hero of this entire project.

Being such a unique medium, the Porcelaine paints will set you back a bit if you stock up on lots of colors at once (a 45mL bottle is about $6) and they are easiest to find online (but are temperature-sensitive, and some suppliers will not ship them in winter, FYI). I bought a small starter set of some 20mL bottles and supplemented with a couple of primary colors to be able to mix what I wanted, along with a classic China blue.

Here’s the finished product! (Just a dry run before the walls go up, but you get the idea).

It was not until I started reading the jars, about to paint, that I noticed they are made in France, so my little French baker really does get a French kitchen!

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Veneers and façades

Tags

art, crafts, dollhouse, miniature, paint, Rik Pierce, stone, tung oil, Undersized urbanite, veneer, wall, windmill, wood, woodwork

Today’s entry is a long one, since my progress on the cottage for the Undersized Urbanite contest has outpaced my blog’s posts.  I chose the title as both can refer to things pretending to be something else, and because they are literally what I have been working on for the past couple of months.  In a way, dollhouses are great examples of pretending, both in trying to make tiny things that look real, and for serving as toys to spur the imaginations of children.  But I digress…

The back kitchen wall got its façade of stonework, as I tried my hand at Rik Pierce’s famous method of making paperclay stones, which was fun but I still have a lot to learn.  You can see another of the little LED wires that will be hidden in the final assembly.

It also came time to give the “old lady” her makeup, and make the cream stucco look more weathered and realistic.  I bought a few soft dry pastel sticks and used a blade to make piles of fine powder.  The walls were all done at once, starting with the lightest colors and dry brushing in layers.  I jovially imagined myself as one of those neat people who paint theme park buildings to make them look old.  Here is a before and after photo:

I also finished my stint as a bricklayer, and the final count was *drumroll* 328 bricks.  I have about that many left, and since I used the more uniform ones on this house, that leaves the ragtag lot for a future project idea, which will work just fine *cackle.*  I finally figured out a pattern with dimensions that worked on the front of the mill tower and fit with the existing double basketweave on the sides, called a half basketweave.  I was glad it came together, but in the future I will think more about brick spacing before I build the walls.

As for the veneers, the floors and walls of the windmill are made of wood marquetry sheets, which I got for a great price from a merchant in the UK.  Honestly, in the past few of months I have seen the number of ebay listings for pretty veneers skyrocket, so there is now a lot of nice wood to choose from.  Some are sold as plain wood sheets and some come with heat-activated adhesive backings, which I actually found curled the edges of my wood strips, so I stuck to plain wood glue.

I had fun picking pieces out of the mixed lot (and enlisting family for help), and then it was mostly a matter of patience cutting, sanding, and gluing tiny strips ad infinitum.  I highly recommend this stuff for anyone wanting to lay a dollhouse floor, because of how thin and workable it is, while capable of being sanded and stained.

The bakery floor is an amazing warm muninga and the upper floor is a deep chocolate wenge (pay no attention to the man behind the curtain…I mean, the absurd number of LED wires gushing from the back end).  I had wanted something different upstairs and dark woods were rather common in the Tudor period.  Plus, I think the brown will go well with the robin’s egg blue walls I have in mind.  The tops of the rail posts were cut off of some 1:12 scale kitchen table legs, glued to new posts and drilled for the rope.  The ladder and drive shaft for the windmill will pass through the opening (hopefully).

The mill’s tower is covered in red gum and alder wood (since I didn’t have enough of any one type to do the job), and the floors of the tower are larch.  I was going for something more agrarian and simple for the windmill, like old, rough planks.  You can also see the inside of the root cellar I have had a love-hate relationship with these past few months.

I used tung oil on all of the veneer, which is great at bringing out the natural color of the wood without making it too glossy.  Tung oil is a natural finish made from tung nuts that has been used for centuries to seal and protect woods.  One unfortunate source of confusion for those who wish to use it is that many companies create a mix of tung oil and other liquids (mineral spirits, linseed oil, etc.) and sell it as “tung oil” or make a product with no tung oil in it at all and advertise it as a “tung oil finish.”  I hunted around online and bought a small bottle of 100% tung oil for a few dollars, and I was impressed with how well it worked, even in only one coat.  In reading up on it, I learned some people add citrus oil to speed the drying time, because it can take days.  I don’t know that it did much, other than add a strong orange smell to the nutty tung oil, but it was preferable to the chemical odor of most finishes.

There is still a long way to go on the cottage, but I am promising myself the walls will be vertical by the end of this weekend!  Tally-ho!

Katie’s Door

Tags

barn, crafts, dollhouse, door, doorway, furniture, lantern, miniature, shop, stain, Undersized urbanite, veneer, windmill, wood

The mill’s door was a fun side project, and is named for my friend who managed to be involved in its entire design process.  I have to say she has good taste.  Unfortunately, the door came together so quickly that I forgot to take regular pauses for pictures, other than the couple of quick iPhone shots I sent her before staining (which you get to see too).
The door began as lengths of wood, which were taped together and set against the doorway to serve as a stencil.  Once marked, I gently sanded the wood until I had the round shape.  I removed the tape and sanded the individual boards to make them look aged, then carefully glued them back together.  Not knowing what to do next, my friend and I flitted around Pinterest, sending each other pictures of doors we liked.  We discovered Pinterest holds a surprising bounty of photos of windmill doors.

When we both proposed a Z-frame design at the same time, it was going to happen.  I had forgotten windmills are really agricultural buildings, and probably first cousins with barns.  Additionally, this building is a mix of parallel and diagonal lines, and I was pleasantly surprised that I could repeat the angle of one of the beams on the upper floor (my geekiness has just been reaffirmed).

The bolts were punched out of a thin sheet of wood veneer, and I will be expounding on the many uses of this stuff in a later post. Since the bolts were real wood, they could be stained, and after Katie and I deliberated and I consulted my eerily multiplying library of stains (think Tribbles), a warm mix was devised for the door.  It unintentionally came out close to the doorway’s color, but the consensus was to leave it.  Sadly, I cannot show the finished lantern because I don’t have all of the parts yet, and because I want to finish covering the walls before I attach something so delicate.  I can give a little preview of the great bead I found for the glass portion, with the light on.

I had great metal rondelle beads from a friend to use as the doorknob, and on a trip to Etsy and I found some beautiful brass findings to serve as doorplates from a very nice seller down the road.  Headpins became nails, and the front door was almost ready to grace its house.

I had purchased the tiny hinges ages ago, and they were finally getting some use.  Those little devils are tricky to install, and I learned some good don’t-do’s for the next time I do hinges, but thanks to some creative crafting, I finally got them to work.  I am also becoming convinced that a certain percentage of a miniatures project is to be spent combing the carpet on your hands and knees, looking for parts (maybe that is why they are called “findings?”).

In the end, I was really pleased with how Katie’s door came out.  I think it makes the shop look quite homey.  Thanks for the help, Katie!

 

Gemstone of the Month: Pyrite

Tags

April Fool, cube, fire, fools gold, gemstone, goat, gold, golden, iron, jewelry, kid, metal, pyrite

To all of my readers, I decided to skip March on account of a lack of interesting gemstones. I have thus decided to go into the wide world of goat appraisals.

Yes, this goat looks quite satisfactory…If with a touch of ennui.

I know, this is a poorly-concealed April Fool’s joke to make up for forgetting to do a gemstone post in March. However, my ever-inspirational husband came up with the perfect stone for today: fool’s gold.

I myself used to be mesmerized by pyrite, and spent a significant number of hours as a kid combing gravel parking lots for golden cubes in the dust.  In addition to simple geometric forms, pyrite can take on the shapes of disks, globes, and can even seep into fossils, creating amazing results.

 Pyrite ammonite fossil. Item for sale at AmmoniteFossil on Etsy

Called fool’s gold for its obvious similarities and tendency to be near gold deposits, pyrite is quite beautiful in its own right. The name comes from Greek “pyrites lithos,” or “the stone which strikes fire,” because when iron is struck by pyrite, it creates a spark.

Pyrite has the same chemical formula as marcasite (FeS2), and as such, they are sometimes confused for one another, despite having different crystal structures. Pyrite is common worldwide, though there are famous deposits in Spain, the US, and Germany. At around 6 on the Mohs hardness scale (harder than gold), pyrite is actually a fair choice in jewelry pieces, and from what I have seen, it is currently in vogue.

As for other uses, Native Americans purportedly polished pieces of pyrite into mirrors, and pyrite was mined during WWII as a source of sulfur for sulfuric acid. Pyrite is thought to be a protective stone, shielding its wearer from harm or difficulty.

And now, back to our regularly-scheduled dollhouse and jewelry posts.  (Sorry, I’m out of pictures of cute goats.)