I'm a Giant . finished for now

The studio apartMac is finally finished! I took some photos before we went out of town last week but I had some technical difficulties and only managed to upload a couple of quick shots to Flickr. I am happy with what's here but I'm going to take advantage of the extension to edit a little bit and refine some pieces.

I stuck closely to my inspiration and I think it all came together. Of course, my favorite bits are the little macbook and iPad from lilushop (thanks to Modern Mini Houses for the tip).

The billy balls that my assistant (3 years old!) and I made are perfect in the eBay vase.

I've seen this wood slice wall art around the internet a good bit so I had Mr. Lemon chop up some sticks and I glued them above the fireplace (another cheap eBay find). The little houses are from a vendor at Handmade Arcade and the birch logs are from Gigi N Studio.

I'm most proud of the wood shelf. It was a scrap leftover from the fireplace slices and it fit perfectly above the sink (that's a chair from the Irwin Interior Decorator set).

These are just a few of my favorite vignettes. With the extension, I'll be able to take better photos in different light and get some good views of the whole thing. The iMac is a beautiful piece of design but it's so hard to shoot the scene!

I'm a Giant . making some progress

It probably seems like I haven't been working on my studio apartMac but that's not true. It's just that I've been doing all these little things that don't look like much. I spent a very long time on the stone floor. The vinyl sheets were from eBay and I had to cut them to the size of the base which meant stacking one on top of the other. To make it look more realistic, I cut away the top layer in a stone pattern then sealed up the seam. You can't tell in the right lighting that it is not one piece.

I also worked on the kitchen unit. I made a farm sink out of pieces from the Irwin Interior Decorator Set. I think it looks pretty good although I do need to touch it up a bit and attach the bar table.

On the left side of the unit, I'm building a wall behind that fireplace. I have an art piece in mind that I'm very excited about. If I use the Petite Princess chair, I will paint it so that it looks like grey leather. This tiny space can seat more than 10 guests! And there is so much more in store. I'm hoping to finish up this weekend.

While I enjoy holiday crafting and all the sewing I've been doing for the doll I bought my assistant for Christmas, it always feels right to work on the minis.

I'm a Giant . billy balls and beads

My assistant and I went to our local bead shop to pick out some vases for the iMac studio apartment. We found these yellow resin beads to use on the mantle perhaps. The 3-year-old picked out the turkey for her dollhouse and it is having a lovely time, so I hear. The wooden bead has already been painted white and will probably become a shade of grey. We will fill it with the 1:12 scale billy balls we made. The white slate is the flooring I plan to use. It's a bit shiny in a plastic sort of way so I'll fill in the grout more and Frank Lloyd Wright it up after our Fallingwater inspiration.

These are the first run of billy balls. I think they are more 1:6 but they look great in the pink "vase" from the bead store. They now also live in the upstairs dollhouse with the turkey. Her house is play scale (Ryan's Room), so about the size of 1:12 but not actually to scale and very chunky for small hands. I think these look great on this 1:16 Petite Princess chest in this photo but the smaller ones are way more awesome.

Finally, I bought a few sets of the Kaleidoscope furniture for my birthday from Fab.com. This green flocked sofa and fuschia chair are actually quite large. I would say they are more like 1:10 but I'm not good with numbers. I have a Lundby and usually work with 1:16. I really don't care about scale (although you wouldn't know it from this post) but these are just too big for my purposes. I really want to keep the coffee table. But if someone wants to buy this (box, olive rug, and all but the coffee table), please let me know. It's actually quite heavy.

I think if you have a house that has tall ceilings or a more open floor plan, this would be great for you. I'm happy to take it out of the box again and measure it or photograph it next to familiar objects (don't you love all the diet coke cans on eBay?). Email me if you're interested: lemoncadet at gmail dot com.
I paid $29 for it. Make me an offer. If you're nice, I will throw in some handmade billy balls in the scale of your choice (or both).

Giant . space planning

I started putting some furniture in the studio apartMac. I am surprised at how much stuff I can get in there. I'm thinking I'll cut a hole in the back that will be a stairway leading to the lower level where the bathroom and bedroom are -- kinda like in a boat.

That TOMY sofa is killing me. I hate it in there; it's just what my "assistant" (to steal a term from MyRealitty) was playing with in our Lundby. I was too lazy to grab something else.

I will definitely be making some sort of kitchen area from these Irwin (Interior Decorator Set) pieces. My plan is to research Manhattan apartments for their kitchens. There is little I love more than House Hunters when it's set in NYC. I'm like Babe, pig in the city when I go there.

I've been adding lots of inspiration to my Pinterest and working away on the Billy balls.

I'm a Giant . pulling some loot from the permanent collection

When I'm playing with my miniatures sometimes I pretend I work for Rachel Zoe and I "pull" styles from my vault. Yeah, it's like that. I might use this fireplace instead of making a hanging one like planned. The speakers from the iMac are too big. The sofa is vintage Fisher Price; I printed out the bricks and used this as a fireplace in a scene. I'm thinking of painting the trashed Petite Princess chair to mimic grey leather. Oh, the colors in the background are scrapbook paper I'll use for stuff. Maybe I'll use the yellow Lundby chairs or the acrylic chairs but definitely with a different table. Maybe the Eames rocker will live in my studio apartMac and maybe I'll paint the elephant in one of these ochre shades. See my new MacBook and iPad? Awesome. Some drawer pulls and knobs, another stolen idea.

These are the accessories I'm starting with. Why yes, that is a Princess Diana commemorative plate. That's how we roll. That's a wheel of brie and a Rilakkuma flan. Indeed.

I'm a Giant Update

Things are really coming along well with the iMac dollhouse. Here is the shell of the home. I think this will be more of a roombox with just a main living space OR perhaps something like a studio apartment. We'll see what happens when I start placing furniture in there.

Here is the template for the floor. We (well, Mr. Lemon) cut some dowel rods so that the final floor (foam core) will just rest on top of these supports. That way I can take it apart to store it in our super small house and also change out the flooring. We've had to hack quite a bit of the inside of the iMac away to make it work but I'm so happy that this will be a reusable space.

I've been adding away to the Pinterest mood board so check it out. I also spent the day making Billy Ball flowers out of air-dry clay and wire. I ended up making some that are really too big so someone lucky who loves the 1:6 may win out. I have to wait until they fully dry to paint and flock.

I'm a Giant!

I have been wanting to jump into the I'm a Giant mini challenge since it was first announced but I felt like I couldn't just make a scene in a roombox like I always do because it's a challenge and I wanted to do something really cool.

Then I remembered it. The iMacquarium! A while back I had come across these things when trying to figure out what the heck to do with that massive old iMac we had collecting dust in the basement. I tried to get Mr. Lemon to help me make a dollhouse with it then and he said no.

But here he is now with the 143 blog getting inspiration from their geodesic dome house. We have one of these (in real size) in our neighborhood and stalk it regularly.

I don't know why he changed his mind but we set to work right away. On my laptop screen is the pdf we found on the iMacquarium site telling you how to take apart the computer. Unfortunately it stops where it gets hard but we figured it out.

Here's where we are in the process now. The shell needs surprisingly little to stay together and weighs next to nothing. I've started a Pinterest board with all my inspiration. This weekend I'm going to troll through my minis and start pulling some pieces. I know that I want to use bits of the computer as accessories. I'm hoping to use the roundy parts the speakers are incased in to make a hanging fireplace. I'm excited to get started. We have already been to Michaels for supplies and Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater for proper inspiration.

Oh, and if you do decide to take your iMac apart, it might help to know that the colorful part of the case isn't tab in slot like the rest of it, it's more like these pull down tabs in slots so don't try to pry it out, you have to tug it down before pulling it out or you will break one of the tabs off like we did.