viernes, 12 de febrero de 2010

Pastry / Pastelería


We could not miss out some pies and bread, nor our typical empanadas.








No podíamos perdernos tartas y panes, y tampoco empanadas.



And for our sweet tooth....

Y para los golosos....

Fruit and vegetables / Fruta y verdura


We need some fruit and vegetables to store in the fridge and to prepare our meals. Cold porcelain was great to model these pieces.








Necesitamos fruta y verdura para guardar en la heladera y preparar nuestras comidas. La porcelana en frío resultó excelente para modelar estas piezas.

Living-room / Estar

There will also be a place to sit and read, watch TV, listen to music, play...




También habrá un lugar para sentarse a leer, ver tele, escuchar música, jugar...





Bedroom / Dormitorio


The girls will have their bedroom, specially decorated, and there will be a cradle for the baby.



Las niñas tendrán su dormitorio especialmente decorado y también habrá una cuna para la bebé.




viernes, 5 de febrero de 2010

Furniture 1 / Amoblamiento 1


I bought most of the furniture. It is made of MDF and the reason is I wanted pieces that would resist a child's play. In that sense, these pieces came in very handy and my job was to paint and decorate them to give them some charm.

This is a kitchen cupboard, hand painted and lined inside.




Compré la mayor parte de los muebles. Están hechos de fibrofácil y la razón es que quería piezas que resistan el uso de los niños. En ese sentido, esta piezas resultaron muy prácticas y mi tarea fue pintarlas y decorarlas para darles algún encanto. Este es un mueble para la cocina, pintado a mano y revestido interiormente en papel.




The table and chairs will be part of the kitchen.










La mesa y las sillas integran la cocina

Furnishing 3 / Equipamiento 3

The sink and cupboard was built in MDF and it was covered with a thin coating of cold porcelain, silver painted, the same as the taps and faucet.






La pileta y el mueble bajo-mesada fueron realizados en fibro fácil con una fina cubierta de una capa de porcelana fría, pintada en color plata, al igual que las canillas y pico.

Furnishing 2 / Equipamiento 2

The kitchen involved my own woodwork because the commercial products did not come up to my expectations. They gave me ideas though but, how could you have a stove whose oven does not open or a fridge without a freezer that you can open to store food?




La cocina requirió mi trabajo de carpintería porque los productos comerciales no llenaban mis expectativas. Me dieron ideas pero, ¿cómo tener una cocina cuyo horno no se abre o un refrigrador sin freezer para guardar alimentos?

lunes, 11 de enero de 2010

Furnishing 1 / Equipamiento 1

The furnishing had to be adapted to child use - neither too fragile nor too simple. Luckily, manufacturers in Argentina have come to provide a good number of pieces of furniture following scale 1:12, in mdf. This simplified matters because I purchased all those pieces I considered indispensable and made those that were not available.


The latter involved the bathroom suite. Here I used the expertise provided by Laura and Ale, two expert miniaturists, who gave me directions to model the bathtub, sink, lavatory and bidet. The pieces were modelled in thick density styrofoam and then they were covered with a thin sheet of white cold porcelain. Once dry, I painted them pink and later varnished them.

I decided that the taps would be safer in cold porcelain as well so they were modelled in the paste and later painted gold.

lunes, 4 de enero de 2010

2010 Great Project / Gran Proyecto 2010

I promise to cover up this long silence since July with what has been going on. In fact, it has been a training period, learning techniques mainly about modelling cold porcelain with Ernesto and brewing over what this great project involves.

Prometo cubrir este largo silencio desde julio contando qué es lo que ha sucedido desde entonces. Este ha sido un período de aprendizaje de técnicas de modelado en porcelana fría, con Ernesto y luego empezar a elaborar el proyecto.

The challenge was to build a doll house for my granddaughters, because during this period Juana was born. The house had to meet two requirements.
- it should allow to be taken apart and
- it should be child safe

Se trataba del desafío de construir una casa de muñecas para mis nietas, porque en este lapso nació Juana. Debía cumplir dos requisitos.
- debía ser armable y desarmable y
- debía ser segura para las niñas

I did some research and consulted my mini soul Proppy and she came up with this suggestion: Melissa and Doug's house.

Realicé búsquedas y consulté a mi alma gemela de las minis, Proppy,, que me sugirió algo así como la casa de Melissa y Doug.



Obviously, the problem was solved for the manufacturers who can build such houses for commercial transaction, with sophisticated tools, that reduce manufacturing time, as expert carpenter Eduardo told me. Analysing the detailed plans that my husband, Robert, drew for me, Eduardo came up with a simplification that would allow me to construct the house.

Como es obvio, para los fabricantes de este tipo de casa puede hacerse en forma comercial con herramientas sofisticadas, que abrevian el tiempo de fabricación, tal como me dijo Eduardo, carpintero experto.

However, I still needed the opinion of Gustavo, who sold me the wood, who gave me orientation and even gaveme some odd pieces of mdf, to complete the construction.

Sin embargo, aún necesitaba la opinión de Gustavo, mi proveedor de madera que me orientó sobre el tema y también me obsequió piezas de fibro fácil para completar la construcción.

Finally, everything was set to start the job. 9 m of strips of pine wood with a central 3mm indentation for the scaffolding, two pieces of mdf 51cm x 46cm for the floors and odd pieces for side walls and roof. But most important, the vices and drill bits XXX that would allow to fasten the pieces only by using an Allen wrench.

Finalmente, todo estuvo listo para comenzar la tarea. 9 m de varilla de 2cm con un surco central de 3mm para la estructura, dos piezas de fibrofácil de 51cm x 46cm para los pisos y algunas piezas para las paredes laterales y el techo. Pero, más importante aún, los tornillos y mechas que permitirían asegurar la estructura empleando solamente una llave Allen.






It began to take shape so that further details could be provided.

Then came the challenge of starting to think of the decoration of floors and walls. Selecting paper is quite a task and I did this by downloading some choices from Lemog (an Internet site with a good assortment of catalogues for the real world) and by using wallpaper samples that I got from a catalogue I obtained from a decorator's shop (Flor's suggestion).













To simplify I would avoid hinges although I entertained the idea of solving the problem with some strong tape. But then it occurred to me that a pair of sliding doors with some faux vitraux could both be doors and window panes!