Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Miniature Love

Ahh... the perils of killing time on eBay.
You start out searching for something and somehow end up looking at things totally unrelated. In this case, it was dollhouse miniatures. These miniature kits came up and were ending soon. Impulse bid and here we are ^.^;
It was a listing, based in Sydney, for 4 kits (cake shop, bridal shop, girl's bedroom and baby room), and it was a steal!

After the purchase, searches specifically for miniature kits reveal there are heaps of these types on eBay, particularly from China.

First up, the shop kits.
Comes in a yellow box that says European Miniature Shop and shows 4 variations of shops.
The first one i tackled was the cake store (bottom right)
Front
Back
In true kit fashion, the inside reveals lots of materials required and "engrish" instructions.
With the amount of materials provided, there is very little room for mistake.
There is really only enough material inside the kit to get it right the first time. Cannot make a mistake. If you mess up something, there is no extra material - scavenging is required to try and make up for it.

Some of the wooden mdf pieces did not fit even though they were meant to be cut to size =S i guess that is what the sand paper was for.
I had to create a light fitting out of cardboard myself as the small wooden bead they provided in the kit was totally curved and wrong for the light fitting and wouldn't have worked.
The engrish instructions called the piece wooden round bead, so i guess they just included anything that could vaguely fit that description. Some strange substitutions. The resulting light fitting would not only have been frustrating  but would not look remotely like the photo they show!

It took around a week to complete this cake shop. There was alot of small fiddly bits, especially making the cakes. Introducing "Cake Love"...
..
Ta da!

Shop Front
Lights are on, must be open for business!
I gave the shop front a curved awning, instead of an angular looking creased (90 degree fold) awning shown in the kit
Come inside..
My custom light fitting is larger then the kit's photo but is more in proportion with the shop and looks better =P
Cake display
Take a seat and enjoy the sweets at your leisure


The orange silk table cloth is my own substitution as i couldnt get the pink polyester satin they provided to stay put.
Walking past at night and the lights are still on!
Painstaking but satisfying end result - looks really cool in the dark with the lights on =)
Although, dont go man-handling anything as its all quite dainty and delicate...