Spring time is for the birds

Just so you are not confused this is a real life birdhouse, not a birdhouse for a dollhouse. I love creating small architectural objects and build them for a number of functions.

Every now and again I will raid the piles of accumulated materials I have gathered and build something. I made this Victorian inspired A frame, chickadee sized birdhouse a few years ago. I used Vermont Green slate roof shingles, a copper pipe for the ridge with a brass stamped cap shaped piece for the ends of the pipe. The green patina solution I put on the copper and brass looks to be a close match in color with the green of the slate. Cutting the slot in the copper pipe to fit over the shingles was the scary part. It was done on a 10 inch table saw, I had to hold the copper pipe in a custom fixture I built.

The walls are made from salvaged tongue and groove boards from a old house I used to live in. I decided to shape the ends of the boards into triangles to repeat the overall shape of the house. The rest of the wood pieces I cut from cedar except for the little dentil molding. That was a dollhouse molding I had sitting around. I gave all the wood a finish of semi-transparent white oil based stain.

It was a rather whimsical and fun project to build and sold just about as soon as it reached the gallery.

Maybe someday I will recreate it as a birdhouse for a dollhouse in 1:12 scale.

1:12 fireplace from real stone

You can click on the photos to enlarge them.

Here are the promised photos of a fireplace I built for a dollhouse. The stone was gathered from a leftover stone pile from a real life chimney in Carmel by the Sea, California. I am able to work this soft limestone with a hammer, chisel and tile nippers. I do cut down larger chunks on a water cooled diamond tile saw although they could be split up by hand just about as easily. There is a hollow plywood box as a form under the stones for the chimney and interior for the fireplace. I hope you enjoy seeing it. Real stone looks so grand and yes so very real. I love the crisp, sharp, broken edges. That would be very difficult to achieve with paper-mache.

As you can tell by the interior scene this is a Christmas themed dollhouse. The elves are busy cooking in the kitchen. More photos of the project below.

Bonjour Poupée

You can enlarge the photos by clicking on the images.

A couple of summer's ago I took my first trip to Europe. I chose to spend several weeks in the Normandy region and the better part of a week in Paris. Now and again I will be posting some of the photos I took. The trip was for me a research excursion to see in person many of the types of real life structures I would like to create in miniature.

As I was touring in some of the towns and villages I began to notice that more than a few people chose to display their dolls in the windows of their homes and apartments.

I thought you would enjoy seeing them and perhaps thinking about doing something like this in your French Cottage.