Penny Farthing Stores and a Water Garden

Penny Farthing Stores - in 1/48th Scale  is the second little building I've managed to get finished so far this year....in my dreams there were (are) to be more....
The little old shop had a name before I even started building and it just remains for a new owner to decide just what it might sell.


A year or more ago I bought some tiny penny farthing bicycles - bound to be useful I thought - and the idea for the shop was born and been 'in planning' in my head ever since. The old stone-built one storey building has been around for a long time, but the owner gives it a fresh lick of whitewash inside and out every few years.

The generous window would be perfect for displaying anything from general stores to antiques- or would show off a lovely tea shop inside.  The mossy old thatched roof on this tiny building is permanently fixed down.

The door, which is half glazed is slightly ajar just waiting for the first customer, and of course the Penny Farthing hangs in place at the end of the building.  This is another little rural building so there's a grass path at the front and an old overgrown climbing shrub has begun to scramble across the roof at one end, while at the other a pretty tree is covered in palest pink blossom.
Of course we need a shopkeeper and someone to buy his goods.......two of the new tiny characters.
 Penny Farthing Stores stands on a base 5 1/2" x 3 1/14" and is approx 4" high. It will be on sale first on our stand at The Thame Fair on 22nd February.

If you follow or dip into this blog, you'll have noticed in recent weeks a bit of an emphasis on miniature gardens of one sort (and scale) or another - this one has a pond in it!

Ever since Celia Thomas and I developed a new way of creating both still and moving water for our Nostalgia in Miniature Workshops 1/12th scale project, The Victorian Seaside, for Dolls House and Miniature Scene Magazine, I've been wanting to do it again.

This is on a much smaller scale - 1/48th - and is a little pond filled by a stream rushing through a grassy, hummocky wild garden.  A small bush hangs over the pond which has a water lily floating on the surface and iris planted at its margin. The bright yellow flowers on the edge of the pond are as close as I could get to marsh marigolds in such a small scale, but I hope it works. 
After working on the cottage  (in the previous blog) and shop, I  have to admit it was pure indugence and I loved making this little scene.  As a free standing garden, which measures 2 1/4" x 1 3/4" and is approx 2 1/4 inches high to the tip of the bush, it would look lovely butted up against an existing 1/48th scale house or pretty on its own. It too will be first offered for sale at The Thame Dolls House and Miniature Fair.


Thank you for looking
Robin