Boars' Heads

I spent last weekend at a miniaturist workshop working with modelling clays. We learned several new clay techniques. And, importantly, corrected faults in our improvised processes under the tutelege of Angie Scarr. Angie is a renowned polymer clay miniaturist who has taken the miniaturist polymer clay art-form leap years forward. She has over 30 years experimented with and fully understands the properties of the clay. But she also closely observes colour, texture, repeating patterns in nature so that her models are truly lifelike.

Now I don’t want to bore you (I’m sorry but a pun is intended here) with an account of the magnificently realistic peeled apples, oranges and bananas that we made. Or the strawberry plants that were left in various stages of assembly at the end of our second day. Yes, some of us were rather slow workers even though we had a small strawberry planter to fill!  Nor shall I “show and tell” the wonderful cuts of salmon and whole fish we made, with shrimps on the sid. These will no doubt feature in a later blog. and they will certainly feature in my MedievalMorsels online shop.  Except the bananas which, without checking, I am reasonably sure did not feature in a Middle Ages or early Renaissance diet. But every other food type we modelled over three days  could be found on the Medieval high table.

I do want to mention that I was intrigued that we drove daily to and from the course in Kent through a village called Boar’s Head. Here I should thank my brother-in-law Jon for driving my sister Lucy and I rather early each morning - yes we were keen.

Now I have always felt exposed to criticism, ever since I first opened my MedievalMorsels online shop in February of this year, because I did not model a boar’s head. Afterall it is what most people think of when first considering Medieval and Tudor food. Well admittedly we might think of the more usually served pig’s heads as well…

So I had to bite the bullet and model one. Well last night I modelled three and here they are.

One is decorated with strawberry flowers, leaves and berries. Oops I’ll never finish that strawberry plant now! 

They make an outing to a new UK Miniatura event in Solihull tomorrow Sunday 16 November - lets see if any dolls house enthusiasts out there like them enough to buy them! To do that they would have to drop by the “Abasketof…” stall where my sister and her friend Gillian’s beautiful contemporary food and table settings will be on display. We both hope for a successful day at this new event in the internationally renowned Miniatura calendar.