The Ceiling Solution

Having tested my foam core ceiling and realized how a fixed ceiling would impede access to the room, I decided that a removable ceiling was definitely the way to go.  Using the cove as a "lip" on which to rest it also appealed to me.   I liked Jodi's idea of fastening the cove to the ceiling, so that when I inserted it, it would stay nicely in place.  However, with the animal heads affixed to the wall up near the cove, I was afraid they would be at risk every time I put the ceiling back on.  My solution was to create a lip within a frame.  The frame would attach permanently to the walls, and the lip would extend in over the cove.  The "stepped" framework would allow for exact placement of the ceiling each time, as well as make it more stable (I hope).

Cutting wood is not my strongest skill, and it's also one of my least favorite things to do, so for the "frame" of the ceiling, I used a combination of strip wood and plywood.  The part that sits over the fireplace and inglenook has a layer of my leftover board and batten on the part that will face down into the room.  That is because, according to the Historic Structure Report for Sagamore Hill, the real-life inglenook has a tongue and groove ceiling.  (Yes, I know no one will ever see it, but I'll know it's there.) The board and batten is 1/16" thick.  To get a 1/4" thickness (in keeping with the rest of the room box), I added a layer of 1/16" plain basswood, then a layer of 1/8" plywood all glued together with wood glue and clamped with about a dozen clamps.  (Seriously.  We had to make a run to the hardware store to buy more clamps to make sure I had enough.) 

 The main part of the ceiling frame is made from 3/8" and 5/8" strip wood.   The 3/8" strip wood came in a 1/8" thickness.  The 5/8" inch came in 3/32," so I added a layer of chipboard to the base to bring it up to 1/8" thickness.  In an effort to create further stability, I had the cross-wise (back wall) strip of the 5/8" wood run from the left wall to the inglenook ceiling, and the 5/8" pieces that run along the side walls butt up against it.  However, the 3/8" side wood pieces run all the way from the front edge to the back wall, and the cross-wise 3/8" strip is inserted in between them.

This creates a lip all the way around on which to place the ceiling.

I glued the frame to the engineered piece that fits over the fireplace and inglenook, and puttied and sanded the join.

I then cut two pieces of 1/8" thick plywood—one to fit within the lower lip of the frame:

And one to fit on top over the ceiling and the lip, and within the top layer of the frame:

One piece was cut lengthwise on the plywood sheet; the other was cut cross-wise.  I was hoping that that would also provide more strength and stability.   More wood glue and clamping later, I had a single ceiling/roof piece that fits within the frame and on top of the lip.  Edges were puttied and sanded (although the exterior will all be covered at some point) and all the wood was primed and sanded.

View inside:

There will be cove in place around the top of room, and there will be trim (similar to the picture rail trim but painted green) around the inner underside of the lip.  This will help cover up the join between the lip and the removeable ceiling.

Detail from the actual ceiling

The underside of the ceiling itself will get embossed paper (and paint).

The embossing on the sheets doesn’t show up very well.  It's this pattern.  Unfortunately, as you can see, no matter how I position them the sheets won't cover the ceiling without a bit of piecing.  *sigh*  Now I'm just waiting (im)patiently for my trim and cove to arrive.  <tapping foot>

Since there isn't much eye candy in this post, I thought I'd post a picture of the main rug in progress.  I looked everywhere for a miniature rug pattern that I thought was close to the original.  Finally, I gave up, and made up my own pattern.  You can see, in the upper-left-hand corner, how it will look with the dark blue background filled in.  It's far from perfect, but it will mostly be covered up by the lion skin rug anyway.  I'll also have to design a border for it.

It is being worked in tent stitch on 28-count linen.

Then I got the most wonderful surprise in the mail yesterday!  Samantha (BluePrint Minis) sent me some gifts all the way from Australia.  Because she knew how much I liked the work of Tiny Finery (whose Etsy store never seems to be open anymore), she picked me up the sweetest little pair of shoes and a handbag at the Brisbane Miniature Show!  The shoes come in their own little shoe box with tissue paper, just like a real pair of shoes.  Then she added one of her flotilla of tiny model ships, because I had mentioned how much I like miniature ship models!  All of these adorable treasures have already found their way into the Merrimack (my mid-century modern house), where Margot and Jim, the imaginary owners, are thrilled and delighted with their gifts (as am I).  😊  More pictures to come.  Thank you, Samantha!

Thank you all for visiting and have a great weekend!  Happy mini-ing!

More Experiments with 1:24 Clothing – a Victorian Walking Suit

I think I have a plan for the ceiling of the library.  I have bought some of the wood and am waiting for more materials to arrive.  I hope to get quite a bit done this coming weekend, but I never know how the day will go. 

While I'm waiting, I decided to play around with an idea for one of the cubbies in my dollhouse shadow box.  First, I made a little sewing machine, using the Phoenix models metal sewing machine and the treadle table kit from Jane Harrop.  (When looking around for images of the plain metal sewing machine, I found this; clearly, whoever put this together is not familiar with sewing machines—they put it together upside down!)  The Jane Harrop kit was wonderful to work with, and she provides very clear and thorough instructions.  The wrought iron bits are beautifully cut.

I have my very favorite dressmaker's mannequin, which is really a charm from Bead Landing's Pemberley sewing set at Michael's.  I have attempted to corner the market on these, as they make such perfect dress forms for half scale.  😊  I clip and file off the loop at the top, use some JB Kwik Weld to attach it to a wooden disk for stability, and give it a quick coat of flat black spray paint.  If I want to make something using a long skirt, I just glue additional disks to the bottom disk until I get the height I need.

Inspired by some pictures of Victorian women's walking suits, I decided to see what I could produce in miniature.

I noodled around with the basic bodice pattern from my pattern book, as well as some additional patterns I found online for Victorian walking skirts, men's jackets in miniature, leg-o-mutton sleeves and a (Barbie?) doll's bridal dress that had some really good shaping in the bodice.  Once upon a time, many eons ago, I took a class in flat pattern making in college and am thankful that I did.  It really helps when trying to adapt patterns in miniature!

The shirt is just a shell, made from white cotton voile.  I wanted to cut the skirt on the bias but realized that of course that would only work if I were making a true gored skirt, which I wasn't (not in half scale!).  The pattern that I picked just uses darts at the top for shaping.  As you can see, while it looks lovely in front, the back is all wrong.  One side ends up being straight, while the other is angled.  So—back to cutting the front on the straight of grain.

I played around with cutting out a tiny motif from a bit of lace to accent the shirt.  My sewing book recommended doing this, and I decided I liked it.  (It isn't glued down in the photo below.)

The jacket was harder than I thought it would be.  Now I know why clothing for male dolls always looks a bit odd—lapels are not easy to do in miniature! Also, on my first try, I felt I did not achieve the poofiness I wanted at the top of the sleeves.

So I ripped them off and tried again.

All in all, I'm pleased with my first completed suit (and, yes, I've saved my pattern pieces).  I used some Stitch-Witchery to do the hem, but all other seams are glued, and I relied heavily on Fray Check when cutting out my pieces. I used an overcast stitch to gather the top of the sleeves.  Fortunately, the thread folds to the inside, so you really don't see it on the completed suit.  The fabric is from Miniature Luxuries.  I used brown flower thread for the trim.  The buttons are gold microbeads.  The belt is a bit of 2mm brown ribbon, with a small gold square from some nail art as the "buckle."

As a reminder on size, I've photographed it next to a matchbox.

That hat is made from paper, with more flower thread and ribbon trim.  The little feathers have been clipped from a peacock feather.  I "borrowed" the umbrella from the front hall stand in the Fairfield; it's just a painted charm.

Thanks for stopping by!  Hope you all have lots of good mini time this weekend!

Pondering the Ceiling and a Side Project

This weekend I cut out a foam core ceiling for the library to test it.  It does truly give a sense of the room as a room, but you really need to look at it at eye level to see inside.  Even with the lights on, it's a bit dark (please excuse the surrounding mess on my work table) and getting my hands inside will be very tricky once the ceiling is in place.

Viewing it at eye level won't really be a problem, since the shelf where I intend to put it is at the right height, but I'm still not entirely sure what I want to do here.  Being able to get into it is more of an issue. A completely removable ceiling is not a great option, since there is a cove where the ceiling and walls meet.  What might be ideal is if I could figure out a way to slide the center piece of the ceiling (the piece inside the trim) in and out as needed.  Still thinking about it.

On a positive note, I have now finished filling the large bookcase – 417 books so far!

I still need to finish filling the smaller bookcase, but it should not take as long, as there are fewer shelves to fill and some just have large books lying on their sides.

While pondering my decision on the ceiling, I've taken a needed break from bookmaking to try a few other things.  Some friends on Greenleaf (hi, Carrie!) have been making gorgeous clothes for a room box project, and it made me want to try a few things in half scale.  I have made a couple of half-scale clothing items in the past:

My very first effort-a simple dress for the attic of the Fairfield

Coat, hat and shoes for the Orient Express

This time I want to try something more complex.  I now have a book of patterns and techniques specifically for 1:24 clothes, and I have some ideas for Victorian/Edwardian dress.  At the very least, I can display them in my new shelf unit.

I started small with a couple of little corsets.  To keep things simple, I used this pattern.  The fewer pieces to work with in half scale, the better.  😊 I shrank the pattern down so that it is about .9" in height.  My corsets are cut from a very lightweight, fine nylon jersey material, the kind used for making underwear.  Because almost all braid is too thick for half scale, I used flower thread, which is thicker than a single strand of embroidery floss, but not as thick as perle cotton.  I learned from Emily at Den of Slack that it makes great welting for half scale upholstery, so I thought I'd try it as braid on clothing and am pleased with the result.  I also used fairy lace, which I ruffled along the bottoms by making a running stitch through it using a fine needle and some sewing thread.  The little bows are made from some 2mm-wide silk ribbon.  The little buttons are clear pearlescent microbeads.  I really wanted to add a rosette, but there really aren't any small enough to work in half scale, so I made a little knot from a single strand of embroidery floss and topped it with a larger pink microbead.

In the above picture, I put them on mannequin cut-outs, because they were so difficult to photograph otherwise!  Below, you can see the pink corset laid out on the bed in the Fairfield, ready for my imaginary homeowner to put on.

Have a great mini week, everyone!

The Boar's Head

This week, in addition to working on books, I made the boar's head for the fireplace valance wall.  At the suggestion of Brae, I tried air dry clay for this piece.  The pluses were that I did find it easier to shape, and I really liked not having to bake it.  The minuses were that it kept wanting to dry out as I worked with it because I was using such a tiny amount, and I waited 36 hours for it to dry before doing anything more with it.  That may have been overkill, but I wanted to be safe.  The fact that it dried out while I worked with it wasn't too big a problem—I just kept smoothing on a bit of water, and all was good again.  I did find a couple of cracks once it was fully dry (I filled those in with some wood filler), and, for some odd reason, the ears and tusks flattened in toward the head as they dried.

I forgot to take pictures in his unpainted state, but here he is painted:

You can see how flat his ears got, and you can also kind of see where I repaired a bit of cracking.  I wasn't too worried about that, because I knew he'd be covered in flock, which would hide any little blemishes.  I used regular craft paint for painting him (except for his tusks and teeth, which are ivory Testors), and that did not seem to have any detrimental effect on the air-dry clay.

After I flocked him, I added the little bit of mane that boars seem to have.  Based on other pictures and drawings of boars, there is a definite ridge of hair coming up along the back, so I added that with some longer clippings of embroidery floss.  Here he is temporarily on the wall and in comparison with the original.

I am down to my last two shelves on the larger bookcase (yay!).  I'll soon be working on the ceiling.  I may do a test run with foam core, as I'm a little concerned with how much the ceiling will cover up the room and whether it will make it difficult to look inside.

In other news, I was the lucky recipient of a hanging shelf unit that the original owner no longer wanted.  It looks like a dollhouse.  

It is approximately 15" x 15," and the majority of the "rooms" are 3" high and about 1¾" deep. That is obviously a bit too small for a real half-scale room, but I thought they might make good places to display pieces that don't currently have homes or for small vignettes.  I plan to paint it white, then use cardstock cut to fit each cubby for painting, wallpapering, flooring, etc., so that I can change things out at will.  Maybe they can even provide a good backdrop for displaying items for my someday (wishful thinking) Etsy store! 😉