New TUTORIAL available! Spooky Fireplace...

Want to learn how to make a spooky old stone fireplace and fill it with your own handmade pumpkins? I've created a special tutorial with 27 step-by-step instructions to teach you exactly how to create your very own fireplace fit for a miniature fantasy / witch's home and filled with colourful pumpkins and jack o' lanterns.

This tutorial comes in PDF format and you can download it instantly from my online shop. Just click here to find it at the Pixie Dust Miniatures shop.









Exactly what you will learn how to make....

- A 'stone' fireplace with mantelpiece,
- Several pumpkins / gourds (some which glow in the dark),
- A Halloween vase,
- Halloween bunting flags to hang across it.

Techniques taught...

- How to create realistic brickwork, aged stone slabs (with my special aging technique),
- How to sculpt realistic pumpkins / gourds,
- How to paint a realistic pattern on pumpkins / gourds,
- How to sculpt a vase, including an special tip for a tidy finish.

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Shop announcement

The PDF tutorial is available right now, but as you will probably notice the rest of my shop is currently on 'vacation mode'. I am out of the country for 1 week having a holiday in Lanzarote with my family, so will not be able to ship miniatures until I am back. However PDF tutorials are electronic so you can download them instantly - even when my shop is on 'vacation mode'.

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This is what you'll learn how to make!

 

My Tutorial in DHMS Magazine!

Guess what?! A new Pixie Dust Miniatures tutorial which details step-by-step how to create your very own Crate of Dragon Eggs is now published in the current issue of 'Dolls House & Miniature Scene'!

A bit about 'Dolls House & Miniature Scene' magazine...

I am sure that most of you are familiar with this magazine, but for those who perhaps are not, click on the links below and discover it today...

'Dolls House & Miniature Scene' is a monthly magazine published in the UK and an excellent resource for miniature hobbyists, serious collectors and professional miniaturists. Each issue has projects, reports on fairs, clubs and miniature news from around the world and great articles about all kinds of miniature artisans. I love diving into their articles and finding all sorts of inspiration there.

They have a website here - where you can find this (latest) issue.

Hope you enjoy my Dragon Egg Crate Tutorial as well as the rest of the magazine. Here's a little preview of it... ;)

Miniatures in Motion

As many of my readers are aware, when I am not creating miniatures to sell to collectors, I am working in Los Angeles in the art department of the film industry. Well recently I have been focusing a lot of energy on the film 'Myrtle the Witch', which was written by myself and for which I am building the scale miniature sets and hand-sculpting the characters and props. It will be created mostly the same way as films such as 'Coraline', 'Frankenweenie', 'Wallace and Gromit' and 'The Nightmare Before Christmas'. So if you're a fan of those films then please do click over to the links below and show your support for my film - 'Myrtle the Witch'!

There are good witches, there are bad witches... and then there's Myrtle. 

This film is about Myrtle and her quirky little world - her household of monstrous pets and her haphazard attempts to fit in and be accepted.

Thank you for showing your interest by becoming a fan of the Facebook Page here

And if you want to follow my blog about miniature film-making and Myrtle, then find it here.

The production company website is here.

Thanks a lot!

PS Stay tuned as I will be running a Pixie Dust Miniatures competition soon in which you stand to win a rather large and exciting prize... one of the conditions for entry is that you follow the above mentioned Facebook page and blog! :)

My Workspace - dragonskin spellbooks

Anyone remember my dragonskin spellbooks which I made back in 2011? I had some which opened, and others which didn't - both ranges had genuine leather covers. I used various mixed media to make the leather shimmer different colours like dragonskin. (See one of the old posts about them here).

Well when I run low or run out of an item I like to re-make but change the design and find ways to improve them. I liked the old design, but I wanted to do something a bit more special this time, so these dragonskin spellbooks are made of the same leather, but with the addition of a Swarovksi crystal set into the leather on the front. The crystal isn't simply stuck on - instead I bought a new tool from the internet so that I could stamp into leather and cut the exact depth and size to set the gem into. This way the books still stack neatly and are smooth on the front.

Here's some snaps of them and the scorcerer's library which will house them until they all sell... in the making of course. The bookcases and fireplace are Bespaq and I bought them as unfinished wood. I stained the wood and aged it, then applied gold to the mirror frame, and I painted the fireplace to look like green marble.

 - Stay tuned to see it all finished!

Follow my progress here on this blog or on the Facebook page.

Find my online Pixie Dust Miniatures Etsy shop -where these NEW dragonskin spellbooks will soon be listed.

Pumpkins and Jacks for Halloween!

It's already September so I'm starting to plan for Halloween 2013... starting with these witchy pumpkins in one inch scale.

Here we have smiley pumpkins, worried pumpkins, smiley gourds and Jack o Lanterns.

I'm going to start listing them at my online Pixie Dust Miniatures Etsy shop momentarily...

Forgotten Magic

Last year, whilst living in Middle Earth (aka New Zealand), I created all sorts of spooky items for Halloween. However, it came to my attention today that some of these little magical miniatures were never showcased here on this blog!

I realised the error when doing some work for my other brand. I stumbled on photos in the archive which were never shown, so today I fixed the mistake (blogging about it here). It got me wondering if I'd ever forgotten to show something here on Pixie Dust Miniatures, and to my horror -I had!

So, today's the day to upload images of forgotten magic - miniatures from Halloween of last year (2012) - never before seen....!

Here we have... Ghost Bottles, Beetle Treacle and Gnome Pots. All three essential magics for the witch's kitchen or spellroom can be found at my online Pixie Dust Miniature Etsy store.

Ch-ch-ch-Changes....!

Logging onto my Etsy shop today I realised there are yet more changes to the site again and I have had that David Bowie song 'Changes' in my head ever since. ;)

So, not long ago Etsy allowed sellers the chance to create an 'About' page for their shops so that they could tell their shop's story and talk about how they make their products and so forth. I love this new tool and created an About Page for Pixie Dust Miniatures which you may have seen here, (or see preview below).

Today I see that they have changed their 'Feedback' section and now instead of three grades of feedback (positive, neutral, negative) they have a 5 star rating. Okay, well I am not sure this change is a benefit, but I will wait and see if I get anything less than 5 stars (and be totally distressed if I do!) See how the Five Star Review section looks (image left).

Below is how my shop looks on Etsy today.

Whilst we're talking about Etsy, some of you may have noticed I have added very little to my shop since the spooky cookbooks... but I will have a small Limited Edition Halloween range this year, so look out for that. I wont be making 10 of every item and usual - maybe just 1 or 2 of each as I have so little time these days.

Stay tuned... :)

My Workspace - Heart of a Witch's Home!

Very occasionally the worlds of Pixie Dust Miniatures and my other company collide. I have been building out a colourful vintage / retro kitchen in one inch scale (for a project and also magazine feature I'll share soon) and am actually making it flexible enough to be used for both companies by swapping out props and furniture.

For Pixie Dust Miniatures this kitchen will of course be the heart of a witch's home (but for the other company it will be an innocent retro kitchen). Complete with sooty iron kettle, dragon eggs on the kitchen island, toadstools on the windowsill and a sign which reads "Well behaved children welcome. The rest will be made into pies." (I found this sign on the internet and just loved it so I printed it and mounted it to sanded and then painted basswood).

So... about this work-in-progress kitchen...
It was built by me out of MDF (and in part, foamcore). I made several pieces of the furniture from scratch, and other pieces were altered by me quite significantly. I cut wooden panels for the back wall, painted walls and put days of work into it. Here are some in-the-making photos I have taken along the way. I'll share the finished project here and on my Facebook page in a week or less.

Note that you can see the kitchen goings-on at my other blog (here) so check that out too!

Don't forget to follow and like!

PS The last two photos were quick snaps of the kitchen as it is today but I am still arranging the furniture and making changes, so the finished kitchen will be different... ;)

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Look - Cookbooks!

Now on shelves in Gilda Grimbly's London bookshop - cookbooks which have topped the 'Witches Weekly' best-sellers list!

You can find classics like 'Baking with Snails' and 'The Poison Cookbook' and also new release cookbooks by up-and-coming celebrity chefs such as 'The Big Book of Bug Recipes' and 'The Dragon Egg Cookbook'.


Impress the coven by cooking up such dinner party classics as Python Wellington and delicate cream pastries with garden snails.

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I've just released these perfectly detailed miniature cookbooks (all my own unique designs) and you can find them at my online Pixie Dust Miniatures Etsy shop. They are one inch scale and I used high quality paper and ink-jet printing, so you can read the tiny print on the back, front and spines of the books. Enjoy!

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