"Penny Lane" English Cottage

 Hi everyone I finally have started to build more houses after a busy summer and holiday season.  This house I am naming after my twin sister Penny.  "Penny  Lane English Cottage "  I spent about 2 week working on building this house and I guess I just finished in time since the day I finished it the 2016 Miniature Show application just came in the mail.  So I need to step up my game and start building more houses for the upcoming miniature sales show.  I spent 1 solid day just creating each stone for the exterior of the cottage and then 1 day and about 10 hours mortaring each paper stone onto the cottage.  On this cottage I did something a little different and plastered the interior walls of the home and then aged them to give it a really old look.  I also keep trying to create or try something new on each of my houses, and on this house to create the Thatched Roof look I really did something different.  I used Animal Fur-fake of course.  Then lots of glue and mojpoj to harden the fur.  I hope you enjoy the pictures.  My daughter took some pictures of me by the cottage to show the size.  Have a Fantastic Month Everyone!   Stan 

I think this is my favorite part of the house, the old barn entry area with the pigs lounging around. 

 I wanted to go for a really old garden looking cottage when I did the landscaping and decided to also have lots of green and red and flecks of yellow in the thatched rood to make it more colorful, and to make it look really old. 

Me hammering down the nails on the inside floor for the electrical system. 

The look of the thatched roof before I decided to add the foliage colors of red yellow and green.  It was just to boring of a thatched roof with all the bright greenery of the landscaping.  I think it looks much better with the extra colors compared to this picture.

This is what the thatched roof looks like once I dumped a couple of pounds of glue on the rood to harden the fake fur. 

Here are some pictures of what the fake animal fur looks like before I glued it down. 

Very Hairy!!!! 

Very, Very Hairy, but I sort of liked the look at this point.

Pictures of the interior Plastered Walls I did for this house.  I really enjoyed plastering the inside walls which was fun and quicker than I thought it would be. 

All this interior beams of the cottage.

My First Magazine Article on the Fairy Tale Cottage by "The Dolls' House Magazine".

I just had to share the pictures of my very first magazine article that "The Dolls' House Magazine" did on the Cottage I built last year.  I received the magazine right when I just finished the 2nd cottage I that looks a lot like this one, that I just made and posted pictures of last.  It makes me feel awesome that I have something that I created in a magazine and that more people get to see my work and hopefully are inspired to create something of their own, or maybe want to have me want to create something for them.  Have a Wonderful November Everyone!  Stan

     

 

 
 
 

English Cottage October 2015

Hi Everyone, I just finished my newest consignment job-( The English Cottage ).  A wonderful lady from the Denver Miniature Museum hired me to re-create a miniature house I made a year ago.  But this house was to be bigger and she wanted to furnish it herself, but brought her favorite lights to incorporate into the house and a few pieces of furniture so I could build the house to the right scale.  I am usually very critical of my work on my miniature house, but this one I feel is my best work so far.  I taught myself some new techniques on making the slate tile roof and the stone and rocks around the house out of paper clay.  This one took 11 days and about 55 hours to complete.  I individually made each stone and rock around the house, which I have never done before.  Usually I carve the stones and rock out of the paper clay.  But I was trying to go for a more realistic look and did brick and mortar around the windows and doors and on the chimney.  I really love the way my Slate Tile Roof turned out making it out of Egg Cartons.  I still have blisters from many ours of tearing the egg cartons into little pieces.   Its actually killing me not to furnish it.  But I know she has a lot of incredible furniture and miniatures to put in this house.  I hope you like the pictures and I think I will take a month off on building miniature houses before my vacation at the end of next month.  But I am not sure since I have been dying to try to create a Modern Glass Miniature House.  Have a Wonderful Month Everyone!

Since I made the house bigger than the one I made last year, I am surprising her, since I was able to create more living space in the attic with a roof that opens and you cant tell there is an opening with the way I laid the slate tiles over the hinges and opening. 

I still love using popsicle sticks for the flooring.  It gives it a aged look like its a hundred year old cottage inside. 

 

Picture of what it looked like after applying each stone individually. 

This is how I tried laying the electric tape for the plug-ins.  I actually hard wire the plug-ins into the electrical tape since I am not a fan of the plug ins that press into the tape.  They can get you Swearing since they never hold good and when you unplug a lamp they can come out of the wall.  I want to create something that works better than what you can find in the miniature stores.  I usually glue down the wire from the plug ins I buy and nail them to the electrical tape, then cover them with the wood flooring.