Monday 26 January 2015

Zombies No Longer

It is amazing what a little bit of paint will do, now they no longer look like zombies. I still have to adjust the whites of their eyes a little, once the current paint dries, and then add gloss varnish on the eyes and the mouths. Using gloss not only seals the paint, but makes the eyes "alive".



They are wearing their labels around their middles, so I can keep track of who is supposed to be what character. You may notice the 3 men all have ears, while the 4 ladies don't. Because the ladies will wear complete, Tudor-era head-coverings as well as lots of hair, ears would just get in the way. The men, however, will likely have their ears showing, so they get them applied.

Next up, drawers for the monk, and sandals on his bare feet. The ladies will get shoes, stockings and pantaloons (not in period, but people will turn dolls upside-down!) The other two men will get shoes or boots, stockings, and trunk hose. Those are the easy parts; the hard part will be the clothing itself; only the monk has "simple" clothing. The biggest of the men gets boots and a leather jerkin; that should be fun, as I haven't tried gluing tiny seams on leather. I may resort to sewing for that, if I can find my leather needle. If I get enough done, I will add another photo this evening; if not, you will have to wait until tomorrow.

I used paper clay to fill the crack in my monk's breastplate, and with a touch of paint that break is nicely masked. My fancy Tudor lady's neck break is near invisible; I stuck a portion of toothpick up into the head, and left some below the breast plate, for added strength. The protruding portion was then jammed into the felt body and glued into place. The broken ear is invisibly repaired, nicely hidden by hair.

As I was enjoying a sense of accomplishment last evening, my younger daughter deposited a bag of body parts on my lap: "Mom, I just don't have the time, would you like to assemble, wig and dress the people for my Darling family/Peter Pan house?" What can a retired mother do, except agree to try and find the time.....


My daughter used Sue Heaser's book, Making Miniature Dolls With Polymer Clay, to sculpt these figures, quite a few years ago. Some of these dolls, if not all, will have jointed legs that should be able to sit; so here are Wendy, Michael and John, Peter Pan and Mr. and Mrs. Darling. It was her first attempt at polymer clay sculpting, that book is very good for beginning dolls' house doll makers.
However, this lot are going at the end of the queue; I will share their house with you in another post, as it is under radical reconstruction currently. We are awaiting doors and windows for it right now.
This is not one of my projects; it is a joint project between my Carpenter-in-Chief and my younger daughter for which I am only required (yeah, sure!) for input from experience....


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