The Den of Slack

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Fairfield – Popular Imports furniture

I got started in half inch scale because I received an Avon furniture set as a gift. I bought a few more sets off eBay but was disappointed to find they were not exactly in scale. Then I stumbled across a few auctions for Popular Imports furniture sets… and my wallet has been suffering ever since! These sets are not as readily available as the Avon sets. They tend to be closer to half inch scale and have more pieces than the Avon sets (on average, around twelve). The eBay seller also sent me a 1996 brochure from Popular Imports… click here to see a scan of all the sets available in that year. I’m now on a quest to find as many of these as possible. (Please contact me if you have any available or know where I can find them!)

Here are some of my ideas for using this furniture in the Fairfield. Most of these pieces are from the Crimson Parlor set:

The piano is a Christmas ornament.

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McKinley – mosaic table

I had been intending to buy some kind of pedestal table for the McKinley’s kitchen, but recently came up with an idea to make my own. I paid a few dollars at Goodwill for a butterfly windchime from Pier 1 (still in the box). It had a round, flat glass top and seven glass butterflies that hung down on invisible thread. One of the butterflies was broken, but I thought I could cut the others off and make them into Christmas ornaments or suncatchers. When I did this, I was left with the round top, which seemed like a good size for a dollhouse table top. I have always loved Pier 1’s mosaic tables… I have a coffee table in that style, and had been eyeing a dining table that stopped being available in their stores before I had a house big enough for it… so, once again, I decided to live out my life-sized dreams in miniature.

Rather than building legs, I tried resting the table top on top of a Mackintosh reading table I bought last year and so far have found nothing to do with. Initially this was just to see how the glass piece would look as a table top, but I like the effect so much I may leave it this way. I couldn’t find any good mosaic pictures at the Pier 1 website so I used Google’s image search and stumbled upon this great mosaic supply site. I went through their gallery (apparently all the work of students) and saved several mosaics that I thought might look nice. I resized them in Photoshop to match the diameter of the table top and printed them out.

The little holes in the table top are where the thread for the butterflies went through. With the mosaic in place, the holes are barely noticeable!

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Fairfield – furniture

I started building the Fairfield after receiving a set of Avon Victorian Memories kitchen furniture as a gift (most of which I’m not actually using in the house!) Since this is my first half scale endeavor, I’m furnishing the Fairfield from scratch. I still have a lot of furniture to buy / make, but here are pictures of some of the first semi-completed rooms.

I intended to use the Avon kitchen in this house, but decided instead on something more modern. (This picture of the kitchen was taken when I was debating putting a window where the door should be. I decided instead to board up the door altogether.)

The cabinets and fridge are from a Town Square set, and the oven is an Acme magnet. The table and chairs are from the Avon kitchen. I’ll be doing a bit of bashing to the kitchen furniture before it’s done. I want to replace the fridge handles and sink faucets with ones that look more realistic. Since I’m using the oven magnet, I didn’t need the oven that came with the Town Square set. I removed the door from the Town Square oven to make shelves for cookbooks. I will cover the stovetop up, maybe with a microwave. I’m also thinking of getting another of these kitchen sets and bashing it to make upper cabinets… or maybe putting up white shelves with pretty dishes on them instead.

I bought Delft tile paper for the kitchen, but the dollhouse shop only had one sheet and it wasn’t big enough. So, I scanned it, did a little color correcting to make the blue darker, and printed it out. I wouldn’t have been satisfied with this in one inch scale (even on the best setting, my printer is not as crisp as a professionally printed design) but in half scale it worked pretty well! I put the Delft paper on the walls with the cabinets, and a blue scrapbook paper that looks like sponge painting on the other walls.

(The wires on the floor are from the sconce in the front entryway. I drilled a hole and ran the wires through the kitchen wall.)

I’m starting to think this table looks a little out of scale in the room. I may replace it with a Cassidy Creations pedestal table.

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