Gryffindor fireplace from Harry Potter

Making the Gryffindor fireplace: Very exciting and iconic. The support walls or legs of the fireplace will be wooden cubes from the dollar store, and glued together.



Wood from a Home depot kid's  kit is used for the header. Sand mixed with paint will add texture and make it look like stone. A tiny piece of trim is glued to the top of the header for the mantel. Using polymer clay, a scalloped stone is made to top the right leg of the fireplace.




Painted and dry fitting it in the tower.



Using foam board and egg carton stones is an inexpensive and easy to get materials, but it is labour intensive to do.



The little rectangle box to the left is a bench seat.



I decided to make a flat wall behind the fireplace with egg carton "stone". The back of the firebox needs soot, so I mixed crushed black baked polymer clay with black paint and sponged it on. Foam board and egg carton "stone" are used to finish the  leg, side and back of firebox of the fireplace.








The chimney part will be made with nail files instead of egg cartons. I thought it would look even more like stone. Here I have a cardstock template for the stone in orange. Be warned, cutting nail files repeatedly will ruin your scissors. I sacrificed an old pair but it was worth it.





The support for it is foam board. Adding a little trim to the mantel.

Glueing egg carton stone on foam board for the back of the chimney and the side.



Glued in place, it looks very similar to the fireplace in the movies. The tapestry on the right is just a paper copy for the moment, to dry fit it in until I make a tapestry of cloth.



Still waiting for my Gryffindor badge to come in the mail to glue to the chimney.
Finally, the badges came in! One is really a keychain.




It is a little small for the fireplace.
The other one is a rubber or silicone luggage tag, and after much thought, the decision was made to use this as the fireplace emblem.




Here it is painted with acrylic paint








All finished! Maybe it needs a bigger fire and some wet socks hanging on a fireplace screen. It would be cool to have Sirius Black's face in the fire!
Here's a short picture video you might enjoy!

Tapestries and portraits in the Gryffindor common room in miniature Harry Potter

Making the tapestries. This took a lot of research, and even experiments. I settled on a technique called photo transfer. My mother gave me some old coffee table cloths that were stained and/or had holes in them. The mixture used was equal parts Omni Gel, antique matte Mod Podge, and matte gel medium. This mixture is then thickly applied with a brush to the mirrored image on laser copy paper, then the cloth is applied to the mixture. After drying for 24 hrs, the paper backing is sloughed off with water and a sponge.



These tapestries look pretty good! But they still need the velvet trim. Using an iron on trim purchased from Michaels. It looks too new, but I am pleased that they look like the tapestries in the movie. Weldbond is used to glue them to the walls.











After this exciting moment, we must now turn our attention to what goes on the walls. The portraits! This proved difficult to find all the portraits to print, and some were definitely not high def, but I am pleased with it. Using trim from my wood stash, the picture frames were made to fit on each of the portraits. The paint used is a beautiful gold.





The portraits themselves were sealed with antique matte Mod Podge, and brushing multiple layers in a cross hatch pattern hopefully gives it a oil painting look.  They are glued to some box card for stability.Wood glue is used to glue the portrait into the frame.  Contact cement is used to glue old jewelry chain to the back of the portrait.



The chain is attached to the wall with pins.










Stay tuned for more!

Fawkes the phoenix in miniature

Pandemic masks and headbands

The news had a local hospital asking for people that can sew to make masks. Having a whole tote of fabric, a sewing machine, a little time on my hands, and a helpful spirit, I went to work!
I made some children's masks, and to make them more appealing, ironed on flowers and appliques.








The nurses are complaining that their ears are sore because of their masks, we are making headbands with buttons so they can give their ears a break.



rectangular masks are easy to knock out.

Harry Potter Gryffindor Common room Chandelier

This chandelier isn't the kind of thing I could shop for and purchase! Here is a picture of the original from the movies.



No luck in finding a match for the 6 lamps, but the ones I ordered at miniLAND can be modified.
A friend hacksawed the bottoms off of the lanterns. 


The band was the hardest to figure out. First I tried cutting out the band with cardstock on my Silhouette Cameo, but it was just too fine. Then another workfriend had some aluminum ribbon which she gave me. I folded it to size, connected it after wrapping it around a tube, and glued round wire around the top and bottom.

I would like to use metal for the lamp arms, but I can also try paper q-tip sticks, as you can bend them when moistened. Then, it can be painted a metallic colour. I had been watching Bentley House Minis and she used cotton swab sticks and that was what I did too. The middle piece in gold is polymer clay.

 

It took alot of research and measuring to get the right lengths, but eventually it looks the right size and proportion. The glue was contact cement, which I knew can be painted over. It is not entirely symetrical, but hopefully it will hang levely.



The cotton swab sticks are soaked in water and then bent. After drying, I painted on some wood glue to make it smoother and strengthen it, especially at the bended part.
Here is a red lid found in the kitchen that will hold the cotton swab sticks as they are being glued.



Forgot to take some pictures, but the whole thing was painted with gold paint. Then with the use of some plasticine for support, the lamps were glued with Gorilla glue gel.



Adding the chain and metal was a challenge. Wish my tool box was more well stocked as I only had one small set of pliers, when I really needed two!






The exciting part - attaching it to the ceiling!







Hope you think it looks good. I am pleased with it and may have to distress it a little

Enjoy this little picture video!

food challenge

day 1: Today is a bit of a different blog, but can still be considered as a form of creativity - cooking! The challenge I have set for myself is to use up all my groceries at home. I will still buy the usual staples - bread, milk, eggs and veggies. There are just so many items sitting in my cupboards not being used. The first meal I made was noodles, and a rice paper wrap with meat balls. sounds weird, but it was a quick and easy meal. The second meal is a red lentil soup and for dessert a lentil brownie. Wish me luck for tomorrow!
Day 2: Today is sour milk pancakes. Also made some homemade turnovers that was a big hit.
Day 3 buying pita bread and making donairs with leftover donair sauce.
Day 4: using up cheese sauce on broccoli
Day 5: dry rub on roast with old spices
Day 6 : Using up oatmeal that was hidden in the back of the cupboard
Day 7 : crushing up crotons and using them as breadcrumbs for hamburger patties
Day 8 : banana bread with old bananas