Wasn't It A Lovely Workshop Day !

I've been talking ....on and on.... about  kits, and sore hands and the pleasure of our new workshop for weeks.....on Saturday the day finally arrived! We unveiled The Little Vintage Toyshop to our first group of creative ladies and they loved it!!

Celia Thomas and I - Nostalgia in Miniatures Workshop partners, great mates and unique kit creators had been beavering away for weeks as those of you who follow our respective KT Miniatures and Coombe Crafts blogs know only too well - and if you follow our Nostalgia in Miniature blog as well - you'll have been truly 'informed'!

Anyway on a rainy Saturday in Oxfordshire we rearranged tables and chairs frantically as the delightful Bicester Avenue Garden Centre opened for business, to turn a posh conference room into a working craft workshop area for the day.  As the first ladies arrived to drop off coats and bags, have a coffee and a little retail therapy before starting, we just about got there!!

A huge thank you to all the lovely, hardworking, cheery and talented ladies who participated - you were brilliant and we hope you enjoyed the day as much as we did. We do hope that when you've completely finished and all your little toys are on the shelves, you'll send us a picture or two. Thank you also for your generosity for our Breast Cancer Campaign raffle - well done to the winners.

The first task was to turn a primed carcass into a shop......and they all looked great. A couple of snapshots right at the beginning of the day.

The shop in all it's glory - the frontage was inspired by a real antique miniature shop that we completely fell in love with at the Museum of Childhood at Bethnel Green last year and many of the toys are inspired by those on display there.

We  also reproduced old boxed toys and many others as well as original packaging after some serious (loved it) research and of course - we own a few ourselves....

A question that is often asked is whether we use exisiting patterns or designs - no we don't. These are created following serious research, muddled workbenches, years of experience and quite a lot of hot chocolate with marshmallows at our 'management/design meetings'. It works for us!!

Thanks for looking
Robin