Ruby Lustre Tile

This time it's one of William De Morgan's ruby lustre animal tiles in an appropriate frame, William De Morgan being a very famous potter of the Arts and Crafts Movement in England. (I keep wanting to put a 'Pickering' in there, but no, that was his wife Evelyn, the painter). He made a whole series of animal tiles, hares and hedgehogs and owls and even one with a kingfisher spearing a fish; I'm not entirely sure what this thing is, but I'll bet he got it from a medieval manuscript. It has that naive little-kid feel to it (though his other animals were quite wonderfully naturalistic). I suppose we can just call it a 'monster' and leave it at that.

The frame is oak, with decorative copper studs in the corners.

The back has little hooks and eyes and a new piece of string, courtesy of Joe:

Now Joe just needs a wall.

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Both the tile and frame are out of matboard, again; I painted the lil monster on in acrylic, then gave it a coat of (of all things) Elmer's glue. I was looking for something thick and glossy; I tried gloss acrylic medium at first, but even thinned down it left obvious brushstrokes (I was using the kind artists use for painting, because it's what I had). It just wasn't the right consistency. But the glue worked fine, though it left a few bubbles in the 'glaze' (which is a real no-no in actual ceramics). Still, it's surprisingly convincing, I think, for all that it's just a piece of cardboard.

I made the little eyes out of earring loops that I twisted around (the wire I had was pretty soft, and I didn't trust it to hold its shape). The 'string' is a single strand of embroidery floss twisted and looped back on itself, then tied around the eyes, and glued down, so the weight (such as it is) isn't actually on the eyes themselves. I know in most one twelfth scale dollhouses paintings are simply glued directly on to the wall; I quite like miniatures to be 'workable' as much as they can be, though of course it's easier to get away with it at one sixth scale, because things like gravity actually start having a hold on things. Who knows, when I actually hang it in his living room (when I make his living room) I made end up yanking the eyes out and gluing it to the wall anyway. But for now, it's a thing unto itself.

Scratching Post

Well, it's not anything from the Arts and Crafts Movement, but it's a necessity if one is to protect one's Arts and Crafts Movement furniture, so I made Joe a scratching post. For the cat he doesn't have yet, for the house he hasn't built yet.

You may notice the presence of a paw and a little bit of a pink nose in the corner; that's my 1:1 cat, Ratty, for scale. Here's a better picture of him, sitting in front of the fan to keep his floof extra floofy:

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This one was pretty simple, though it took me a while to hit on the correct yarn for the 'rope'. In the end I used some silk yarn I had for dyeing, and twisted it back on itself, then glued it around a dowel. The bottom is two layers of matboard thick, made to look like plywood (though I didn't get a picture of the bottom), with a hole cut out to fit the dowel into in the first layer. That and the thickness of the 'carpet' (velveteen) is enough (I hope) to hold it all together with a bit of glue. The velveteen is a scrap left from the 70s, I'm pretty sure, and it's not as bright a green as the picture makes it out to be, but I figured it would work well with Joe's proposed earthy toned living room. It works pretty well for 1/6 scale carpet, I think.

Now Joe just needs a cat.

I've been looking at Craftsman house plans again, and I think I've finally figured out what I want to do with the staircase. I wanted the house to have a bit of an open plan, at least as far as the living room and entry way go, but it was very tricky trying to figure out which direction to put the staircase in, given that a dollhouse is strangely one-sided. I wanted it to have all kinds of lovely open woodwork, but I also wanted to get a piano on that wall. I think if the staircase opens out in the living room (rather than the hallway per se), then turns up and around, there will be enough room against it to put a (hopefully Manx) upright piano. That's what I'm going to shoot for anyway. We'll see.