The miniature show was lovely. I almost didn’t get photos because I was using an app for driving directions and it nearly drained my phone battery. (I remember this happening last year, as well!) There I was, driving along, trying to find my charger while keeping my eyes on the road and one hand on the wheel. I was able to charge it enough to grab some photos while I was there.
As usual, I see that I was so intent on figuring out what I wanted to buy that I only got photos from a few vendors. The ones I liked the most, of course. This show is run by the IGMA, the International Guild of Miniature Artisans, so it’s highly curated and most of the booths offer the creations of incredibly gifted miniaturists.
Walking through it elicits one gasp after another. Here are some of the wares I saw yesterday:
From Maddie Gerig Shelley – all sorts of miniature pottery with a modern spin. I was absolutely amazed by her work. She lives near New Haven, and is one of the younger artisans at the show. How does she do it? (Hint: I bought something from her.)
Next to Maddie? Her famous aunt, Jane Graber, who has been making gorgeous miniature pottery for years. I didn’t get a photo of her booth, but I did buy something from her.
Uncle Ciggie’s Miniatures made by artisan Vicky Sanfield.
The bassinets!
Oh my heavens! This is a tour de force. I had a nice long chat with Vicky and I did buy something from her.
Keenderson Miniatures from Ottawa, Ontario. I was over-the-moon with this gentleman’s creations. Look at the inlaid work on that table! And he also made all the floors on which he displays his work. We chatted a long time, too, because he loves the Craftsman/Mission style and I rarely see miniatures in that style.
These tables! I really wanted the circular Stickley-style table but I had already spent too much money. Never fear, I have his card and I can order from him online. Truly swoon-worthy work.
Speaking of swoon-worthy, my favorite booth. It was also my favorite last year. Bubba’s Mini Country Cupboards – incredibly detailed furniture designed by Barbara Vajnar. This year, I had the chance to chat with both Barbara and her proud husband, who was helping to man the booth.
Feast your eyes:
Designed in the primitive style, these are truly to scale, including knobs, hinges, everything. They’re not laser cut, but are made by hand in Barbara’s workshop. Most pieces are made of cherry.
I must have spent an hour, all told, looking at each piece.
The tin in those hanging cupboards is hand punched.
Her work is exquisite.
When I arrived, I paid the modest $10 fee and filled out a card for a door prize, though I never win that sort of thing. Imagine my surprise when I was in the middle of speaking to the artisan from Ottawa and I heard my name announced over the loudspeaker! I won a $25 gift certificate to put toward anything in the show. Hello!
I was tired and dehydrated and I knew I had a 2 hour drive back home, so I only stayed there for about an hour and a half. Today, I realized that I missed a booth from a favorite miniaturist who makes tiny appliances! I don’t know how I missed it – unless he hadn’t set up yet at that point. Ah well.
Here’s what I bought:
This amazing crock from Jane Graber.
Signed by Jane.
This wicker table by Uncle Ciggie’s Miniatures. Isn’t it lovely?
This modern pottery with the most beautiful glaze – made by Maddie, Jane’s niece.
So, so beautiful. I would like a life-sized version, too. She also makes pottery in half-scale which is beyond my comprehension. I don’t know how she does it.
And…my big splurge. Gulp. It’s the most I’ve ever spent on a miniature but, heavens, I’m so thrilled that I have it. (Don wants a life-sized version).
I went for this because of the mustard milk-paint finish and because it was on the lower end of the price scale. Some of her pieces are very, very expensive, but absolutely worth it.
It is so, so beautifully made.
Look at the carving on the side.
The hinges are hand made by another artisan, attached – not with glue – but with tiny little nails. The knobs are perfectly to scale. And notice the tiny little – what do you call them? – door closures. The drawers open and shut.
Barbara’s signature.
I’m glad I went for it, but I took me a long time to finally make the decision. I picked it up. I put it down. I went to other booths. I circled back. I picked it up again.
Finally, I did it.
I’m thinking it will inspire the decor of the yet-to-be-rehabbed little house I found at the dump.
Happy Sunday.
What a fun miniature show. You got some wonderful pieces. It must have been so difficult to narrow down the choices.
It was. Even now, I want to go back and buy more!
The wicker pieces alone could get me hooked. Thanks for sharing.
You’re welcome! The wicker was incredibly well done, Melina.
They’re so beautiful! I can’t help thinking that it’s all much nicer than the full-size furniture I have in my home.
Same here! Everything we have is used and slightly battered!
Thanks for sharing the photos, Claudia. I would have spent so much time at the show! The first photo looks like a display of full-size pottery, if you hadn’t described it. I admire all the patience, deftness of hand, and creativity that went into each and every piece. How fabulous to have a possible center piece with which to begin creating a new miniature house for yourself.
I already have the idea of an English stone cottage. And the hutch really inspires me!
Lovely finds! Artisan pieces take the hobby to a whole other level, don’t they?
Oh my gosh, they do! This can be an expensive hobby, even on a budget! But when you bring in the artisan pieces, oh boy!
OMG, I want the the light green wicker furniture in the second photo for myself! Lifesize in my case of course. Truly gorgeous. I’m always amazed at the skills of these miniaturists & love when you do “miniature” posts – LOL. Can’t wait to see how you renovate & furnish your new dollhouse. Have a restful Sunday. Peace.
#Resist
#ProtectMueller
Isn’t that beautiful! I couldn’t resist getting a piece. My little table was in that display.
Truly works of art! What a wonderful show and I’m so glad you were able to go and to find some treasures. I love all that you bought, but that cabinet is really amazing. I think it is an inspiration piece for sure. I see some winter fun in the doll houses!
I am having trouble getting back on East coast time. I’ve also had a flare up of eczema and it’s so miserable. This too shall pass! Saw Sara and the Grands yesterday and I think they grew in the week I was gone. I enjoyed some fun play time and then pizza for dinner. I have to go to the grocery store today but that might be the extent of my ‘busy’ day!
Winter fun for Claudia! I’m itching to start now, but there’s too much to do here. Raking, buying clothes/supplies for the trip, coaching for a day next week, etc. So, most likely mid-November, I’ll be starting. I have lots of ideas, though!
So sorry to hear about the eczema flare up! Feel better, my friend!
These flares when you have disease are awful. My cousin is currently having a recurrence of Meniere’s with really significant vertigo to where he’s so afraid he’s gonna fall. I’ve been darn sick for the past eight weeks and am just turning the corner, or so says the doctor as of Friday, but I don’t know where August even went; pffftt, gone. Trying to catch up now. I lost 11 lbs from it but it’s a heckuva way to lose weight. Been in heaps of tears. And then my husband used ant spray outside…it is SUPPOSED to be organic…when he didn’t know I was nearby, so my asthma reared up and I couldn’t sleep a wink last night due to labored breathing (better this morning); he felt badly about it. Ugh; I guess I need to live in a bubble.
But the biggest gullywasher was yesterday, Claudia. All in the older age of downsizing and doing what has to be practical with good financial wisdom for fixed-income years (after being a sort of not-thrifty dreamer for too long!), I sold my vintage car. I’d owned her 44 years. The new owner is an enthusiast and collector, so at least he won’t strip her for parts. She’s been my drive-for-pleasure car for a long time; just purrs out on the open highway; still looks so hip and we always get the shout-outs of, “LOVE YOUR CAR; IT’S SO COOL!” (I confess, I’ll miss that. Made me feel special.) Buyer is out of my area, so I don’t have to see her in somebody else’s hands (we didn’t even have to advertise; spread thru word of mouth), which had always been my preference. He’ll probably change her girly color; sigh. Six decades of my life, from my teens; such history in one vehicle. I stretched my arms wide around her in one enveloping hug and said, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but I have to let you go now.” Knife to the heart. Working hard not to fall into a depressive mood over it, but it ain’t easy.
OH, I’m so, so sorry, Vicki! I know what that car meant to you. How awful for you. Just cry if you need to. xo
Thanks. I knew if I shared it, you’d understand and give me a kind word, Claudia. You’re that kind of good gal.
I’ve basically cried all day today over my car, but I just have to get over it, put on my big-grownup-girl pants and move on; can’t keep being such a baby over it. Had become difficult for me to get behind the wheel; I’m quite arthritic and it’s a low-slung/small vehicle; I’ve shrunk in size and was always short in stature, so it got to where I couldn’t comfortably reach the ‘pedals’ in these last years of my life with the car. And we’re trying very hard to reduce expenses; I pay nearly $200/month to keep her in professional offsite storage. So, there was a certain inevitability.
My husband stays positive for me, trying to point out that she’ll get a new life with a good owner who’s got the desire and money to keep her spiffy as we always tried to do. I, in general, have a really hard time letting go of MANY things of my life; I’m not very resilient and I especially put too much attachment on material objects but, for me, they evoke often pleasant memories; memories I very much need. You’d understand this, of course, as you’re a collector/gatherer/keeper as am I.
I keep thinking of the day I bought the car and how I’d not been able to ever amass any kind of credit history at that young age, so Dad had to co-sign even though I had the down payment and was, by then, a few months into a fairly-secure, full-time job. We took her for a test run from the dealership and promptly ran out of gas on the other side of town. My dad was younger then, of course, so he had to sprint a fair distance to find a gas station and buy a can of fuel. SO many memories of where that car went over so many years, what I was doing at the time, who was in my life and in the car with me, the music I played on its dynamite sound system of the day…too much fun, zooming its big 302/V8 engine up and down a SoCalif beach highway and singing at the top of my lungs to that AM radio! Ah, youth.
We photo’d every angle of her last week for my scrapbook. And me with her. Just like the day I bought her. I coincidentally enjoyed (with a pang) reading today about your reader Chris’ 1970 VW; isn’t it great that people hold on to things for as long as they can! Cars, furniture, art, houses, vintage clothes; the stuff of our lives through the many years, recycled, passed on to others; treasured; our collective living history. I have to be glad!
to vicki …
hope you feel better soon (allergies, selling that special car …).
i am glad you took some photos of the car … and can maybe spend some of that $200 storage fee to buy yourself a treat.
i could use your words to describe myself … holding onto things for the mostly-happy memories they invoke; not feeling very resilient … i would add very sentimental. i have always been pretty brave and adventurous, yet find change and letting go to be so hard, painful.
here’s an example … i still have the dress i wore to a daddy-daughter dinner in seventh grade … because i got to go shopping for it with my mother at the big department store and practiced dancing with my father ahead of the dance. that dress has been in a box for about 48 years and i haven’t looked at it in probably 30, but can still picture the fabric and details on it. maybe my great-niece will wear it someday. otherwise it’s not going anywhere.
(tears as i wrote that …)
all that to say i can relate and wish you well.
kathy in iowa
and to claudia …
thanks for letting me share!
kathy in iowa
xo
oh, Kathy, it’s so sweet, and I think being sentimental is a nice quality in a person; it just means you have heart and soul … thank you for your kind words; you’ve often given me kind words!
…no matter what I do, the stupid auto-correct on my computer will NOT let me print your first name with a lower-case ‘k’ as you type it!
thanks, vicki.
no problem about the upper-case k …
hope you have a good week ahead!
xoxo
to linda . .
hope the eczema goes away and you feel better!
kathy in iowa
Me, too; Linda. Meant to say that earlier. Flares are no fun; that’s what I’ve been going thru all of August, just a diff ailment. Let’s all get well!
Vicki, It’s so hard when things just seem to pile up and come at us all at once. I hope you are feeling better. I agree let’s all get well!
Thank you Kathy. I love how we readers of Claudia’s blog are also very supportive of each other!! I’m a bit better today but still a mess. I hope you are doing well!
These miniature posts absolutely fascinate me. When I look at the pictures, especially if there isn’t something noticeable in the photo to show me scale, I absolutely believe they are actual pieces for your home. Just amazing craftsmanship!! Your purchases are beautiful.
It is a lovely sunny day today and supposed to be around 70*. Just a pretty Fall day. My husband is driving down to Illinois to pick up his 1970 VW. He had a new engine put in along with a few other things he had done, and he has been (not so) patiently waiting for about 7 weeks to go and retrieve it. So he and our son left earlier today and one would have thought it was Christmas morning! I hope you, too, have a good Sunday!!
I know. They are so intricate, so well done!
Enjoy your pretty day. It’s not quite 70 here and cloudy but Don is happy about that because it’s perfect photo-taking weather!
How wonderful to have a 1970 VW! Your husband is a guy after my own heart.
It is pretty sweet. The original yellow color which I absolutely love!!
Our family (my parents) had a economical bug for years; got it in 1964, brand new. But just boring white, not that nice yellow. (It’s amazing how, today, they can color-match original factory paint on vintage cars.) My mom called it the Fred Flintstone car because she felt so low to the ground in it, that it was her feet making it go instead of an engine . Dad took our ’49 Chevy as a trade-in for it; we were all used to be ‘ol heavy cars (boats!) before that bug. I like the new VWs, too. They hug the road and look really solid.
my sister has a light blue vw “bug” now. growing up, when i was in junior high and high school, our family had two of them … a bright yellow “bug” and a light blue convertible “bug”. loved them and love my family!
heard vw announced they will no longer make the “bug”. too bad; they were and are lots of fun to drive/ride in.
hope everyone has a good day!
kathy in iowa
The newer VW bugs have some nice colors; I think I know that blue; I like it. They’re not gonna make them anymore? Oh dear!
I am in love with these miniatures!
I cannot imagine how precise & tedious this art work is.
Just mind boggling to me.
Thanks for sharing:)
You’re most welcome!
wow. I am just blown away!
and coming from someone who lives in tornado country it’s the highest praise! LOL.
such workmanship is unbelievable. the wooden pieces.
but especially the wicker? I just can’t see how it’s done! it’s amazing!!!
I love this post. thanks for taking us with you. :D xo
I have a wicker chair that was done by a friend of mine and the meticulous work that needs to be done is mind boggling. Glad you enjoyed the post!
Oh my goodness, I love this post today, Claudia; thanks for sharing the show with us; what a treat. I don’t know how they do it! Such detailed work, like nothing I’ve ever seen, and your purchases are so fine. Congrats on scoring some great stuff for your doll houses! When you can spend money on such authenticity and originality, hand-hewn, it’s….to me…no diff from collecting art like a person would hang on a wall. I don’t know if I’ve seen corner cabinets like you had in one of the photos either. Like Don, I’m seeing things I’d love in my house if they were human-sized furniture/pottery…and you got your aqua hues. Excellent. Really fun. Terrific investments.
I’ve recorded this but haven’t watched it yet; it’s a 3-parter on PBS called The Miniaturist; era of the 1600s in Amsterdam about a teen girl who marries into a rich family. For a wedding gift, her husband gives her a miniature replica of their house, which will be furnished by a Miniaturist who will make the wee things for it, I guess as things go, as she makes the real house her own. But it’s some kind of thriller tied in to this Miniaturist craftsperson. The series is based on a book of which I hadn’t heard. Again, it’s on Masterpiece/PBS, so I’m getting intrigued to tune in to it, as well as watch a video clip I spied which I haven’t yet watched on my local PBS online site which is about how artisans crafted the miniatures for this show.
Yes, I know about it. I have the book. I think I’d rather watch the video of the artisans. The book was depressing so I didn’t finish it!
Oh, dear, now I wonder if I even want to get into that limited series? I don’t need depressing right now!
Neither do I!
Some of the pieces I consider collectible and they’ll just appreciate in value. I know of people who just collect the pieces and don’t have dollhouses. They simply love the craftsmanship of an artisan pieces.
Yes, same here; I know of people who take the miniatures and display them in shadow boxes on the wall; I’m thinking of doing a little of that myself.
xo
what incredible talent and patience in all those miniatures! would be fun to see how they make to-scale details for such tiny little things.
glad you found some great pieces and inspiration for your next project! and congratulations on winning a prize that covered the price of admission and, hopefully, the cost of gas to get you to and from the show. :)
glad you had a fun day. hope don did, too.
kathy in iowa
It was a good day. Don was out doing his photography and he had a good day!
The detail is extraordinary. You picked some lovely pieces….sort of wish they came in regular size. That wicker table is exquisite. Your new dollhouse appears to be off to a good start. I’m sure it was a long day for you…driving always makes me tired.
Rest up and enjoy. Nice here today…perfect fall day! ;)
It’s not sunny here today but it’s nice and cool! Now I’m ready for some sun!
The pieces just blow my mind, Donnamae!
They really are beautiful tiny things! I can feel myself getting bigger and clumsier as I look at them.
Oh, me too!
Amazing pieces Claudia!…I too wonder how these artists work on such small scale with such beautiful results..Congratulations on winning a prize also…that is always such fun…I won a prize myself today at a baby shower which included a Yankee Candle in an apple/pumpkin scent…It smells like a delicious apple pie!…Do you and Don like to burn scented candles?
I burn pine scented candles quite a bit.
Hi Claudia – I like the miniature paintings in the first photo. I was actually thinking of giving the miniature painting a try. Were there many of the miniature paintings at the show?
Thanks, Cheryl
Hi Claudia,
Thanks for sharing such truly amazing pieces from the show!! They are exquisite!! I love the pieces you purchased. They remind me of a crock I have and a hutch my husband’s cousin made that we enjoy in our family room. But the teal wicker table!!! Love, love, love!! I think I’m going to see if I can find You Tube videos of artisans making these beautiful miniatures. Can’t even imagine how they do it!!
I just love your blog! So excited for your awesome very soon trip to Europe!! Thanks again for sharing all you do 😊
Best,
Deb
Thank you so much, Debbie!
Love those mini works of art. Love that wicker tea cart in the picture. I just finished watching the Miniaturist on PBS. The show was much better than the book. I enjoy your blog, thanks for sharing.
Thanks, Val.
Oh wow. I’ve never seen such beautiful miniatures in my life! Thanks for “taking” us to the show. I want your wicker table in human size. Your purchases were all gorgeous. Especially love the Welsh dresser.
I wish I had a life-sized dresser!