Back to work

I am home from the big shows in Chicago and my creativity energy is all recharged. Now it is time to focus on building rather than buying. I have completed the firebrick inside the fireplace box. All that remains in there is to put a little sealer on a couple of bricks I trimmed back. I left it unsealed for the photo so you can see how the sealer really enhances the color of the clay. Look over to the left and you will see a brick at the front edge and one just behind it that look dull and pink rather than a rich terracotta.

I will also be putting "smoke" onto the bricks. It has a very specific type of pattern to the smoke application as  the fire keeps some areas clean while others get the smoke and soot. I am assigning that artistic task over to my friend Don as he is very particular in how he thinks it should look. I do trust his judgement and besides that he is an artist so he really should get out the paint brushes now and again. I will explain all about how it is done later when we get to that part of the project.

At the moment I am busy with the very tedious project of refining stucco detailing and adding some weather checking cracks into the timbers. When I got home I took a close look at the stucco and got out the artist trowel and made up some stucco paste to further refine the surface. Having several weeks off made a real difference in what I could see that looked wrong but before had become too familiar for any real objective personal opinion. That task is not photo worthy or blog time worthy so I will fill in the blog showing you items I purchased in Chicago to put in the house such as light fixtures. Or items I will put into the house when I display it at shows such as pottery and a few chairs.

Naturally being me I also bought a few tool items in Chicago so I will post about those as well.

Miniature reward time

photo copyright Karin Corbin 2010

I have been working on the fireplace and needed a bit of instant gratification. You all know how that works, you just have to try fitting the parts together before it is ready to be glued together so you can see how it is going to turn out.

photo copyright Karin Corbin 2010

OK now it is back to being a stack of parts, my incremental reward break is over for the moment. My reward also served to give me a little something to post on the blog today. I hope you enjoyed it too.

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.

Acorn Cottage Fireplace

Click on the photo for a closeup, use the back button to close the closeup

My what an ornate fireplace for such a humble, woodland cottage. Well that was not unusual in the Cottage Orne style as these were not humble real life dwellings, they were indeed fantasy pieces inspired by the romantic notion that the simple life was the good life. Creature comforts and luxury along with the arts were part of the fantasy.

This fireplace beneath its faux limestone finish is of humble origins, it is EPS blue insulation builders foam. I bet you would never have guessed that. I designed the fireplace on the computer and then carved it using burrs in a computer driven milling machine. It was cut as 5 pieces and then glued together. The stone block lines were detailed in by hand. The stone finish is acrylic paint, no stucco coating as that would hide the fine details in the foam.

I made the grate for the fireplace as well as the chandelier from various bits and pieces of brass and solder. The light bulbs in the chandelier were tinted a warm golden color with Krylon yellow, stained glass spray paint. Squirt a little into a cup and paint it onto the bulb with a brush. What a warm glow it gives the room and it takes away that harsh white glare of very bright miniature light bulbs. The fireplace bulbs were coated with the red and orange versions of the stained glass, spray paint.

The ceiling has a mural of a cloudy sky with just a hint of sunset pink glow to the edges of the clouds. I never would have thought I could paint a convincing sky but it is easy and someday I will show you how to do this.

The print on the wall is from "Les Tres Riches Heures" a devotional book of hours commissioned by the Duc du Berry. I felt the gothic arches in the print went nicely with the gothic detailing on the Acorn Cottage. Tall trees with arching branches in the forest inspiring the arches inside a cathedral all celebrating the glory of God was a common thought in the olden days. Of course my project is simply a cottage in the woods but maybe you will find it inspirational in some small way.