One of a kind art dolls & fairy tale miniatures
To celebrate Etsy’s 13th birthday, I’ll be running a special summer sale in my Etsy shop from June 18th through June 30th. For orders placed during this time, you’ll receive 15% off any purchase of $25 or more. I’ll also have some extra time off to spend on creating this summer, so now’s a great time to purchase if you’ve been thinking about commissioning a custom piece!
I’m still getting settled into my new home (sometimes the unpacking and the boxed furniture that needs to be put together feels as if it will never end!), but my Etsy shop is now up online and my finished items are available to purchase. During my time away, Etsy rolled out a new shop format which I’m still tinkering with. Take a look and tell me what you think (and if you’re a fellow Etsy seller, let me know what you think of the changes)!
I have yet to unpack my art supplies or set up my workspace, so it may be a little while before I’m able to continue my progress on Blush and Rose. I’m so close to being finished with them, though, and I can’t wait to show you the final product when I’m able!
I’ve been holding onto my Peter Pan and Tinkerbell dolls for a while now, but I think it’s finally time to introduce them to the world! Making dolls inspired by Peter Pan has been a project that’s very close to my heart – I devoured this book almost weekly at a certain age – and one that I hadn’t wanted to undertake until I was sure that I could get them right. After many, many sketches, and a lot of practice with Paperclay, Peter Pan and Tinkerbell were finally born.
It was a girl called Tinkerbell, exquisitely gowned in a skeleton leaf…
Tinkerbell is made in the style of my jointed Paperclay miniature dolls, but at six inches tall is a little bit bigger. I wanted Tinkerbell to be pretty (she’s described as terribly vain!) while still retaining some of the rough, gnomish character of traditional English folktales about pixies and sprites. Tinkerbell is skinny with a pointed nose and chin, and her long feet and hands are proportionately very large for her body. She has windswept strawberry blonde mohair curls, and two large butterfly fairy wings.
Tinkerbell wears an “exquisite” fairy gown of leaves and magic and mist. Fabric leaves cover a bodice and skirt of hand-dyed silk and sparkling tulle. Pearl seed bead “dew drops” form a line of tiny buttons on her bodice and are sprinkled over her skirt. A belt of golden thread and red berries pulls her dress together.
Both Tinkerbell and Peter Pan will be available in my Etsy shop on Tuesday the 16th, but feel free to reach out with any questions about reserve, layaway, and pricing.
I’ve been playing with these little one inch scale fantasy miniatures for quite some time now, and have finally decided to list some of them in my shop! I can just imagine them as part of a wizard’s library or a witch’s secret cottage.
Included in the set I’m selling are a magical mirror made from a hand mirror and a vintage unicorn brooch, a little gazing ball made from a clear glass marble and a gold button, two little weathered paper envelopes, one filled with glitter “fairy dust,” two glass vials, one containing “dreams” (white feathers) and the other “desire” (sparkling red thread), a tiny wishbone on red thread, and two miniature parchment maps painted with watercolors and gilt.
I had so much fun using my watercolors and pens to create the tiny paper objects and little tags and labels, and I’m really excited to finally share some of these! If you’re interested in taking them home, they are available in my Etsy shop here.
This past week I added the final touches to Flora and Fauna, my first all-Paperclay art dolls. These sisters were so much fun to make, and I learned a lot through sculpting them that will help me with future dolls!
Flora and Fauna are sisters born from the forest. Flora loves the forest best in the spring, when she can gather wildflowers and herbs beneath the green boughs, while Fauna haunts the misty winter paths, listening to the secrets of the trees and the hush of the snow.
Each doll is about 14 inches tall and jointed at the shoulders and hips. They both come with a removable cloak and a tiny basket of treasures.
Flora has loose, wild brown curls and wears a miniature flower crown. Her Victorian-inspired dress is hand-stitched from materials including tea-stained linen, warm beige silk lace, green satin and velvet ribbon, and wooden buttons. Her removable plaid cloak is lined with moss green silk and hand-embroidered with tiny vines and purple flowers. The embroidery took me much longer than expected – it required several layers of thread for the vines and flowers to stand out from the plaid background. Flora also wears two tall leather boots, green wool socks, and a tiny key charm on a black ribbon.
Flora carries her little wicker basket to store the items she collects from the forest floor. Inside are two miniature glass vials of moss and seeds, a bundle of herbs, moss, and a tiny hand-stitched napkin with a pattern of purple flowers.
Two little antlers, fuzzed with moss, peek from Fauna’s soft braids. Fauna’s dress was inspired by drawings of Rackham fairies, and is hand-stitched from moss green silk, green velvet ribbon, sparkling seed beads, and engraved metal buttons. Fauna’s warm woolen cloak has been tea stained to give it a weathered look, and is decorated with velvet ribbon and wooden toggle buttons. Underneath her thick gold underskirt, Fauna wears two tiny, pointed, high-heeled leather and fur boots. These were the first boots I’ve ever made with heels!
A partridge charm is wrapped around Fauna’s wrist on gold thread. Her tiny basket contains a miniature hand-stitched napkin patterned with dancing hedgehogs, moss, and two little sculpted and painted bread loaves to feed her hungry forest friends.
Flora and Fauna are now available in my Etsy shop, here. Feel free to message me through WordPress or Etsy with any questions about price, availability, or layaway.
I’ve been taking a short break from my Neverland project to work on something new – my first full-sized dolls made entirely of Paperclay! Though I’ve already been making Paperclay mini dolls and full-sized dolls with Paperclay heads and limbs, these are my first to have Paperclay bodies with jointed arm and leg sockets.
Flora and Fauna are sisters born from the forest. Flora, with her flower crown, is the happy summer child, while Fauna, with her antlers and heavy wool cloak, is a daughter of the winter.
Flora and Fauna are still in that rough stage between sculpting and sanding, but I’m very pleased with how they’re turning out. Though I struggled at first with making their bodies and limbs thick enough to be proportionate, I’ve been building them up in layers and I think they’re finally fully filled out.
After sanding and painting, I’ll work on stringing their bodies together. I’m still figuring out what I’m going to use to string them – for my mini dolls I use simple thread, but for these I’ll need something much stronger!
When finished, each doll will wear tiny coordinating dresses, which I’ve been working on between sculpting while waiting for the Paperclay to dry, and will carry similar wicker baskets.
I absolutely love making these jointed miniature art dolls, because they’re so tiny I can sculpt several of them in an afternoon! The sculpting stage is a great rainy afternoon project for when I feel like getting out my Paperclay.
I spent a few afternoons this past week sculpting, painting, and dressing two new little dolls, Sprout and Peony. I’d been wanting to make a fairy this size for some time, and so I had a lot of fun with Sprout! She has tiny antennae made from curls of wire, and I used the top wings of small plastic butterfly to give her translucent fairy wings.
Her little green cap is topped by a leaf charm I’d had laying around for a long time, just waiting for the right project. I imagine Sprout living hidden in someone’s garden, happily chatting with bumblebees and working away in the flower beds!
Peony, on the other hand, is a refined lady who kept telling me how she couldn’t wait to move into someone’s Victorian dollhouse.
I’d held onto the scraps of floral cotton that I used for her bodice for years, after dismantling on older doll dress that was coming apart at the seams. I’d never before had a project small enough for the tiny pieces that were left, so I was very excited to be able to use them for Peony! A tiny bit of gathered lace was perfect for Peony’s skirt, and I topped off her dress with two tiny seed bead buttons.
Peony takes her name from the two huge flowers in her hair – I tried giving her just one, but she demanded a flower for each side!
Peony is already hosting tea parties and baking tiny cupcakes in her new home, but Sprout is available in my Etsy shop.
I’ve always been fascinated by miniatures. As a child, I read Mary Norton’s “The Borrowers” series over and over again, and kept a huge bookcase “doll house” of miniature rooms that I had designed and mostly handmade myself. Recently, I got the itch to start creating miniatures again!
I looked through some of my old things, and ended up finding enough of my old miniatures to create a little fairy’s tea table and a tiny baker’s cabinet. For the tea table, I sewed a tiny rose-print table cloth, and filled the seat of the miniature chair and decorated the table with natural moss. I used tiny ceramic tea cups and a miniature skeleton key to decorate the table, and sculpted and painted a tiny fairy cake, which I decorated with “sugar” glitter.
My favorite miniature I created for the tea table is a tiny bottle of “dew drops” – a miniature corked glass bottle filled with seed pearls and rhinestones. It’s tag is handwritten and decorated with glitter. I imagine the little fairies sweetening their cups of tea with a drop of dew!
For my little baker’s cabinet, I used a lot of miniature kitchen items that I already had. The cabinet was originally unfinished, and I stained it green with watercolors and sealed it with matte varnish. Scraps of fine white lace decorate the top and middle shelf. I absolutely love all of the teeny tiny dishes, pots, and baking pans! Another miniature skeleton key hangs from the top door, and a few tiny white shells are used for extra soup bowls.
I used clay to sculpt a tiny loaf of bread and platter of cookies. My “loaf” has salt worked into the clay so that it looks more realistic, and each cookie has a sesame seed pressed into the center. Like my bottle of “dew drops,” I created a little container of cinnamon with brown and gold seed beads for my cabinet!
After successfully sculpting my first full-size Paperclay art doll, I thought it would be fun to try sculpting a miniature dollhouse doll with the remaining clay. I’ve always been fascinated by miniatures, but have had trouble sewing a miniature doll. Sculpting one was much easier!
Sculpting Poppy’s tiny face and elf ears was the hardest part! After she dried, and I sanded her smooth and jointed her limbs with thin wire and tiny beads. She can sit and raise her arms.
I painted Poppy with watercolors (I used watercolor pencils for the details), and used dyed Alpaca left over from my larger doll for her hair. Poppy’s tiny dress is made using tea stained linen and lace remnants from my Sonnet doll. Her teensy buttons are made from seed beads.
Poppy will be available in my Etsy shop very soon, although it may be hard for me to give her up!
My Green Angels are a project I’ve had sitting in my studio for a long time, but haven’t been able to find the time to finish. Yesterday, I finally had some time to myself, and now here they are! Each rustic Green Angel is created with natural elements. The cloth of their bodies is tea-stained and stuffed in the bottom with natural moss and tea leaves to weight them and give them a faintly spicy scent. Their limbs are created from natural twigs, and jointed with antique buttons.
Each angel wears a rustic key around her neck and a simple dress made from tea stained lace and trims and green wool felt. Delicate butterfly wings sprout from the angels’ backs. I like that, although they are very similar, each angel has her own personality.
The angels will be available in my Etsy shop in just a few days – keep your eye out!
The Free Folk 