The competition that wasn't .......

I'm such a duffer!

No, I haven't been rustling sheep or cattle.  For those of you who don't speak Australian, if we call someone a 'duffer' it is a way of saying that they've been silly.  I can sort of see how it grew from cattle or sheep duffing - after all, they are both pretty silly things to do too, especially in the days when you were likely to get shot for doing them!

So why am I a duffer? Because I was making a pergola for a club completition.  Closing date was the end of last weekend.  My structure was done (I had chosen to do mine in quarter scale), but I was waiting for flower kits to arrive to do the decoration.  Then the organizer asked whether another week would help people - I was very pleased, but didn't take in the rest of the email, which apparently said 'please let me know'!

So here I was during the week, working hard on my entry.  I didn't have my laptop on very much for several days because I was busy backing up my old one, then using the transfer program to move everything to the new laptop, backing up my email program and transferring it to this new one, installing programs on the new one and all the rest of the fuss that goes with a new computer.  And I was slack about keeping up with my emails.

I completed the furniture and accessories for the interior.  There was a table and bench made from scratch, using the bits that are left once laser-cut pieces were removed for furniture kits.  I always keep these because the wood is nice and thin and comes in useful for all sorts of things.  The pots are bought plastic ones, just painted and 'aged', the tools are made from card and the rest from printies.

 Some ivy grows up the lattice on the side, made using the few bits of leftover kit I had.  Railway greenery covers the dirt in the garden at the bottom since I didn't have the flowers I had planned to put there. 

With some wire that was left over from other flower kits, and some petal shapes that I 'stole' from my hollyhock kit, I created a pretty little floral decorative wreath (I love doing these)

Then an order arrived from Judith Dowden, with a couple of flower kits that she happened to have, including one for a hanging basket with a fuschia plant and a hanging basket with a philodendron plant.  I made up the philodendron

I have almost finished the fuschia too.  There was also a kit for a camellia bush in a pot.  I made that up as well, but 'planted' it in a half scale pot I already had, because I wanted a nice large one.  I ran out of leaves for this plant, then on Friday my part-order from Susan of sdk miniatures also arrived, with another camellia kit and I used leaves from that to bulk out the shrub.

Of course the artist needed an easel, table and stool.  I used a kit for the easel and did the table and stool from scratch, using scrap bits of wood again, mainly from the ever-useful tongue depressors and match sticks. A sketch pad and pencils were necessary as well (printie and bits of wire painted blue).  The pencils keep getting lost.  Perhaps the kitty has taken them off somewhere.

All I had left to do was the clematis vine to go over the roof, when I was pretty shattered to see an email announcing that since no-one had asked for an extension, the contest was closed, and there was a winner :-(  That's what I get for not reading thing properly and for being out of touch for a few days!  It was very hard to keep my motivation going after that, but after a bit of thinking I decided that I would do the clematis anyway.  Now that's no mean effort, let me tell you!  For a quarter scale clematis vine, the leaves are around 1/8"  or 2.5mm long.  The flowers don't take long to do, but the leaves are more tedious.  First you paint one side of the sheet, let it dry.  Then the other side.  Let it dry.  Go over each little leaf and gently rub it with a small stylus to round it slightly then remove each leaf from the sheet.  After that is done, it takes around 10 minutes to add enough leaves for 1" (2.5cm) of the fine wire.  To do the vine for the top of the pergola probably took me 3 days if I put all the working time together.  Here it is:

It's not the best of photos, and I need to add more flowers to the vine yet - I think there are only about 18-20 or so on there at the moment.  But I've had enough for now.

 And here is the finished project.  I decided that I would add my trademark cat to the scene, since it wasn't for the competition any more (or I couldn't have added it).

Overall view with artist's easel etc.

View inside as seen by the artist

 Looking in from the right side of the pergola

So starting from the beginning of the whole process, at first I made a very rough drawing of what I wanted, in order to get some idea of measurements.  They were very unprofessional and undetailed.  At one stage I wanted to be an architect and I do have a tendancy to draw detailed  plans of anything I am thinking of doing but this time - well, this time that didn't happen!  But it gave me something to work from.

The whole thing is made from tongue depressors - the wood isn't bad and it's reasonably easy to cut into thin strips that don't break too easily like balsa wood does.  I  didn't have any timber the right size for the four square 'pillars' that would be the main supports, unless I used some balsa wood that I had.  But I thought that the balsa would probably colour differently from the rest of the timber, so instead I cut strips from the tongue depressors and glued them together to make square pillars.  A bit of trimming and sanding to get them all the same size and thickness afterwards and they were okay.

The 'roof' of the pergola was going to be peaked to provide a bit more interest than a flat roof.  I tend to fiddle and experiment to work out what works, so that's what I did here, until I found the angle that I liked for these pieces.  Once the angle was cut I could cut all the pieces to the correct length and glue them into their v-shape.  I find that using a mixture of tacky glue and pva gives quick grab, fast drying and strong joints.  More fiddling and experimentation to work out where the cuts had to be made for the half joints in both the joists and the rafters, and finally all the pieces fitted together.  Another piece through the middle of the rafters at their peaks helped tie them together and hold them in place.  Then I added some 'battons' over the top of the rafters.  Some lattice on the left side to provide extra privacy/windbreak and support for climbing plants and coonstruction was done.

And here it is, finished but unpainted:

And after its first coat of paint:

Then after it has been weathered and distressed:

It really does pay to read instructions.  While thinking about the project I had been trying to decide on the scene that would go into it.  Wedding? Christening? Birthday? Romantic meal? Lazy afternoon? Sunday morning breakfast?  Chidren playing cubbyhouse under a table?

In the end I decided that perhaps I'd just have a normal outdoors table and chairs, but have an artist's easel set up there too, with a work of art in progress.  The artist's sketch book, paints etc could be on the table, there would be lots of scope for accessories as well as scope to decorate the pergola with flowers.

Then I thought of the surroundings - how about a studio with french doors opening onto the paved area where the pergola was, with more artist's equipment inside?  So I cut the base, made a raised flower bed for one side, ready to cover with paper clay later when I did the paving on the base and set about cutting pieces of card to make the studio.  It was only when I was ready to put the studio together that I paid attention to the nagging doubts that had been trying to get my attention.  I checked the rules of the competition - oops!  No background or landscaping allowed, simple the pergola alone on a simple base.  Only the things on or in it permitted.  Big change of plans coming up vbg.

So.  The base was cut down to just fit the pergola on, covered with paper clay and paving stones scribed into the clay.

And here is the raised flower bed - not for the competition but I will use it for the setting with the pergola.  I also covered this with paperclay, and scribed it with 'stone' to tone with the flagstone on the base.

I had made up the ivy and was ready to attach it, but after considering the pergola itself for some time I decided that I wasn't happy with the colour of the timber after all.  I didn't feel that things would show up well - everything was too brown.  So it went into the microwave to soften the glue and I was able to remove the pergola from the base.  With the glue so soft and malleable I was able to re-shape it all and get it square again too, which pleased me no end.  Once it had cooled and the glue had hardenced I painted it with my ivory house paint, and was so much happier with the result.  My brother (who is a builder) is also impressed, and has declared that he'd like some extending fluid so he could park his landrover under it vbg!

Now it was time to start the flowers and vines to decorate the pergola itself.  Since the only decoration has to be in or on the structure itself, I wanted to make the most of it.  Hanging baskets, a shrub or two in tubs, and a flowering vine over the roof seemed obvious sources of interest and colour.  The idea of gardening in process gres from the desire to provide the artist with a subject to sketch, that could easily be seen by the 'viewer' for the purpose of the competition. 

And where is the sketch?  Well, I'm a bit 'over it' at the moment, so I didn't do a sketch to put on the easel.  So it appears that the artist and the gardener have both gone off for a cup of coffee, taking the sketch with them vbg.  I do hope that the roots of that little plant lying on the newspaper on the table don't dry out too much! 

 And I wonder whether that little cat will succeed in pulling the gardening magazine down off the stool?  Hope he doesn't get into the seed flats.

I hope you like my pergola - even if I didn't get to enter it into the competition I have a nice addition to one of my quarter scale houses, I think.  And next time  I will read the email notices rather more carefully lol!