This began as the Ashley from Dura-Craft.
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THE EXTERIOR:
This part needs the most work. The Paperclay® brickwork on the walls and stonework on the
chimney has begun, but still has far to go.
The chimney is formed from builders foam found
at any hardware store.
The benches were my own design using plans from
a miniature furniture book for reference.
I plan to put thin wooden shingles on the roof using another painting technique to look like slate.
Once the exterior is done I will place the cottage on
a small base of framed builder's foam and landcape
it in a storybook cottage theme.
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 THE INTERIOR:
I am using this house as a way to learn many new techniques using Paperclay® to form the brick, stone, slate, etc. I have kept an eye out for information in miniature magazines, online groups and tutorials on using Paperclay®.
I have also learned to distress perfectly good pieces
of stained wood to look hundreds of years old and used that as moulding around doors, windows and ceilings.
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 Keeping with the storybook theme, after very meticulous measuring and sizing, I have created faded sepia-toned "murals" (Rapunzel, Beauty & the Beast and Hansel & Gretel here) on my computer using Photoshop and printed them out on regular
copy paper. After spraying with several coates of a matt fixitive to seal them, I cut them to size and
pasted them onto the walls in the areas designated
for them, trimming with an x-acto knife.
Once again, I am using a very basic aging technique of a grayish-brown acrylic wash to make all the surfaces of the cottage, both inside and out, look old and as if it has been around since the 16th Century.
I wash over the illustrations as well as the walls, which
I hand spackeled with wood filler in an uneven,
rustic-looking plaster.
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 A close up of the fireplace sculpted out of Paperclay® and painted with washes of brick color and aged with
dry brushed black acrylic to simulate soot.
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 A close up of the sculpted floor washed overall with a grayish-blue and then again with a brownish-black on the stones only, leaving the mortar between gray-blue. Time consuming, but worth it.
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 The right side interior window seat. The stained glass was made by laying out 1/16" strips of blackened tin plumbers tape from the hardware store in a pre-planned pattern. Inexpensive craft glass paint was used to color the diamond shapes. I then went over the windows with a dulling brown wash, wiping it off only the center of each shape to see through.
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 The second floor still waits for plaster to be formed with wood filler and beams to be stained.
St. George and the Dragon make a very
effective mural.
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That's it so far for the Storybook Cottage!
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about how I did something. I'm happy to share.
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