Miniature Bookshelf with Mexican Virgins

These past few days I’ve been working on a commission for Lyn, my online comadre. 

It will be a gift for her mother on Mother’s day and I sure hope she likes it!  She likes purple and is a devoted Catholic of Mexican ascendancy.


This miniature bookshelf is made with my very own personal concoction of cold porcelain and papier mâché.
It has a Rosary made with seed-beads that you can see on this picture ->

 

I love how my dough turned out this time! I tend to experiment with ingredients and the way to prepare it almost every time I make it. I’m certainly trying this way again!  

I molded the legs out of clay and then covered them with tiny bits of hand-shredded paper,

 I glued them on with “engrudo”, which would be the equivalent of barbotine, if this was real ceramic’s clay, as in mud, I guess.

I’m really glad I remembered to take pictures while I was making it.


Surprisingly they seem to be less than I thought I had.

I had made a few figures with my dough and was trying to figure out how many I might need for all 3 shelves, and how I would paint them. 

I really love how translucent and 
flexible my dough came out this time, I could roll it paper thin and then ball it up again without it showing!

<-Look at how it captured the light on that Virgin’s cape!

Here I had most base colors layed out, except for the purple background on the second shelf, that’s a piece of China or tissue paper I placed there to give me an idea of how it would look that way. 

I know the Virgin’s picture to the right isn’t sharp, but I loved how the evening sun hit it! 

I also crocheted a tiny doily with some -regular- cotton thread to place on a shelf.

I don’t know the name of this blue virgin, I have seen her image at many different places down here, including my elementary school, which was catholic.

And I also knew I should add some violets since a lot of people favor them in México, and them being purple, I suspect my friend’s mom may have at least one! :D

 And all of a sudden it was done!

 
 I placed a match to add some perspective.

The tray it’s on is painted like some local clay ceramic pottery I’ve seen in my State (Morelos) quite often. I was surprised to see how realistic those pieces feel! I also added a flower vase on the bottom shelf to match it.

I made some tiny books and a purple flower paper cut-out in a frame, some “veladoras” which are short and fat candles that are lit for the Virgins and Saints. And there’s a tall and thin candle as well on the top shelf, for the blue Virgin.

And for the lower shelf I made some dolls that remind me of Virgins, but aren’t. 
The ones on the middle shelf are, my mom had one similar to the one wearing a crown and the one with a blue veil splashed with stars is a must.

There’s a tiny round plate with a heart, because it’s for mother’s day :)