Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2022 i Dolls House & Miniature Scene

This issue is a wonderful abundance of projects, features and advice for you to enjoy! We kick things off with the regular Instagram Identities, which features Sae Nakamura (@pansbear131) and her adorable little bears – they are a sight to behold, so make sure you turn to page 6 to read all about Sae’s journey. Ruth Flewelling Lesbirel is back with her second instalment of Ruth’s Mini Tips, this issue offering her advice on cutting wood and transferring patterns – we hope you’ll find her years of experience very useful! Another regular, It Takes Two, returns with Moi Ali looking at two very different versions of the same house, The Mountfield, with one of them being her own interpretation! Not just our regulars, but lots of new and exclusive projects…

YOU WILL NEED MATERIALS REQUIRED • White, yellow, pastel pink, pastel blue, pastel yellow, green and brown polymer clay • Golden ochre, dark cadmium orange and brown pastels • Sculpey Bake & Bond or similar • Craft glue • Old gift bows in white, lilac and two shades of pink • Mother of pearl acrylic paint TOOLS REQUIRED • Sturdy craft wire or similar • 2cm and 3cm round sugar craft cutters • Roller • Craft knife • Needle tool or sewing pin • Scissors • Small paintbrush 1 Mix white polymer clay with yellow to create cream, rolling the mixture out to roughly 2mm in thickness before using a 2cm round sugar craft cutter to press out four circles. 2 Take some pastel pink clay and, as this will…

There are so many tips I’d like to put into a project each month, but there just isn’t room and it would become repetitive from one project to the next. That’s the motivation behind this series. Last month we looked at available wood species and sizes and which ones work best for different uses. This issue, I’d like to share some tips for transferring template patterns to wood, as well as cutting and sanding the pieces. Transferring patterns Square and rectangular pattern pieces are easy to transfer to wood: simply measure and mark the pieces with a very sharp pencil (mine is mechanical) and a steel or steel-edged ruler, to produce a good straight line. Plastic and wooden edged rulers get nicked over time. The old adage “measure twice, cut…

Jan Jones lives just south of Hobart, Tasmania, Australia: “Last stop before Antarctica!” she told me. Amongst other minis, she is the creator of The Jonesonian, a 1/12th scale Gem, Mineral and Fossil Museum. The design of Jan’s mini museum represents a cluster of quartz crystals, with three galleries and a roof top exhibition gallery, a crystal cave to one side and on the other side an entrance and shop with a gallery of Tabasco geodes above. However, let’s pause for a moment and understand Jan’s journey into the marvellous world of miniatures. She explained: “My mum was always interested in tiny things and had the 1924 edition of the book on Queen Mary’s dolls house and tiny German wooden dolls her mum had brought back from her tour of…

1 Firstly, remove the decal with a knife and then sand the area. 2 Remove the balustrades from the head of the bed with a junior hack saw. 3 Make the new headboard from card and wadding with a swatch of grey velvet over it. 4 Use a needle and thread to pull a tight stitch through the layers every 1cm in four even rows to make it look tufted. 5 Remove the mattress and pillow and wrap in plain fabric. I added a scrap of muslin fabric that I frayed on the ends to make it look like a throw. TO COMPLETE THE ROOM, THE FURNITURE IS COMPLEMENTED BY A WONDERFUL SELECTION OF MODERN MINIATURES AVAILABLE FROM MINIMUM WORLD: These pieces have had the wooden knobs replaced with modern handles…

YOU WILL NEED THE ROAST HAM: • Polymer clay: small quantities of white, translucent, red, light brown, dark brown • Mixtures: Bone = translucent + trace of light brown Pink = 1 part red + 8 parts white Ham flesh = 1 part dark brown + 8 parts pink Fat = 1 part white + 2 parts translucent • Artist’s soft pastel: burnt sienna or dark brown • Quilt wadding NEW POTATOES: • Polymer clay: small quantities of white and light brown • Mixture: potato flesh = 1 part light brown + 2 parts white • Miniature serving dish • A little dried parsley or other fine herb • Yellow acrylic paint MIXED SALAD: • Polymer clay: small quantities of leaf green, green, yellow, translucent, white • Mixtures: lettuce green…

YOU WILL NEED MATERIALS REQUIRED • 2x A3 sheets of white mount board • A4 sheet of 5mm thick foam board • Tracing paper • Cocktail stick • Wood glue • Mod Podge gloss or mat • Acrylic paints • Masking tape • 25mm wide microporous tape • 2x staples • 2x 3mm wide wooden knobs TOOLS REQUIRED • Craft knife and extra blades • Metal ruler • Sharp pencil • 2mm ball stylus • Paintbrushes • Tiny strong magnet 3x1mm • Wire cutters CUTTING LIST FOR MOUNT BOARD: • Cut three rectangles 13.8x16cm, mark two as front and one as back• Cut two rectangles 12.9x7cm, mark both as door• Cut two rectangles 13.5x7cm, mark on as inside and one as end• Cut two rectangles 15.7x7cm, mark as top and…

YOU WILL NEED MATERIALS REQUIRED • Wool • Felt • White card • Tissue • A vintage box label • Glue • Gold or silver (or pearlised) metallic thin card or thick paper • A flatback half pearl 1 Cut a rectangle of felt approximately 4x2.25cm. 2 Fold the felt so the left and the right sides meet in the middle at the back, then crease the folds with your finger. 3 Let the felt open, put glue on the left and right-hand sides, then fold so they meet in the middle again. Press down so the glue holds the felt in this folded position. 4 Cut a neck hole in the top of the felt, through both layers. 5 Measure round the front of the neck and cut the yarn…

Back in March 2020, a number of PP’s eagleeyed Instagram followers spotted something on my old workbench that intrigued them. The photo captured the beginning of the development of a grand quarter scale kit. Before I could properly get to grips with my initial design, lockdown struck and all new project development was quickly put on the back burner. With a member of staff down and with our online orders going through the roof, there was sadly no time to give this fledgling kit the attention that I felt it deserved. However, as a new year entered, I was at last able to refocus on the kit and the development process could begin again! Regular readers of‘At Home with the Broadwoods’ will already know of my deep affection for the…

Take two women, both aged 58, both living in West Lothian in Scotland, and both with dolls houses that couldn’t be more different! Little did I know, when I took possession of my second-hand eBay purchase – a Dolls House Emporium Mountfield – that a lady down the road whom I’d never met, Anne McDermott, was working on the same house! It has taken me a good deal of time to strip my ready-built Mountfield back to basics, undoing all the hard work of the previous owner. Longer, in fact, than if I had built it from scratch! During this time, I have amassed the perfect items to furnish it in my chosen era of the late 1940s/early 1950s. Many houses at that time would have contained furniture dating to…

If you’re looking for kits that require no skill, no painting, no glue, yet produce great results and help a charitable cause to boot, POP UP products are for you! POP UP was started back in 2012 to raise funds to support children in some of the world’s poorest places through the charity Compassion UK, one of the UK’s top 10 charities. Since then, they’ve given away tens of thousands of pounds to good causes in Tanzania, Guatemala, Kenya and elsewhere. As a Scottish-based business, it’s unsurprising that many of POP UP’s kits have a distinctively Scottish flavour. I opted for the Charles Rennie Mackintosh furniture to review and was delighted with the quality of design and materials, the ease of construction and the good results. Laser-cut from top grade…