April 2010
Reviewed
'Magnificent Miniatures'
Inspiration and Technique for
Grand Houses on a Small Scale
by Kevin Mulvany and Susie Rogers Reisl Lackinger
Staff Writer
Time to get hopping with inspiration!
Magnificent Miniatures, Inspiration and Technique for Grand Houses on a Small Scale by Kevin Mulvany & Susie Rogers is a book to get your spring creative juices flowing and leave the sleepy winter fatigue behind. It is available at on the authors' website, www.mulvanyandrogers.com for £20.00 or at Amazon.com.
The team of Mulvany and Rogers recreates, down to the tiniest details, miniature houses, palaces, buildings and room boxes. Their attention to detail is amazing and some of the buildings they have recreated will leave you in awe.
All of the homes featured are of historical significance and/or well known throughout the world. Each chapter is a featured home, building or room box and starts out with an intro from the authors on how each commission came to be, meetings with the particular customer who commissioned the piece and various details regarding gathering information for the commission.
I honestly was more involved with the amazing photographs of the pieces than reading about the why and how of the commission. Most of that information I could only do a quick skim through the first time around. Of course, not to say the information was not interesting. This is just one of those books you know I love - full of wonderful, color photographs! You can't help but keep turning the pages to look at them all.
After poring over the photographs on my first time through, I gladly went back to read all the details. With each intro, the authors go into the details featured in each room. Surprisingly, and to my delight, they include tidbits of history regarding individual pieces in rooms as well as the rooms/buildings themselves. Techniques, history, photographs. . . what's not to love?
Let me give you a quick peek at the buildings that this amazing team has recreated and featured inside this book. Versailles. Need I say more? I know. I got light-headed just by the desire that came over me to own this piece of art.
They feature about three versions they have created of Versailles. In-depth looks at rooms - and as mentioned before - a bit of history is included. In the Galerie des Glaces, the original silver fittings are recreated. Maybe not so interesting, but in the real Versailles these fittings were "melted down by Louis XIV to fund France's war in the Netherlands." So, that's why today we see crystal chandeliers and all of the gilt wood furniture. He had to replace all the silver.
Ok, I'm letting a bit of my love of history sway me, but I would think it would be very interesting for any miniature artist to read the historical significance behind the pieces. When we recreate a piece it makes it more meaningful to know the history.
Jumping ahead a few chapters, we come to Brighton Pavilion. Another stunning recreation, readers are treated to techniques developed to create the domed roof and my favorite technique of theirs for gathering calculations of rooms where photography and touching surfaces is prohibited. I'll give you a hint on the technique: "Chin level with mantel shelf." If that doesn't tell you enough, think of standing next to a piece of architectural detail and then noting where on your body the detail is. Such an easy, yet brilliant, solution!
Several chapters later period room boxes and dollhouses are featured and each chapter gives insight on a certain technique and how to achieve it, like a parquet floor, clapboard and carving palm trees into columns.
My overall impression is that this is a wonderful book to add to the library. It is inspirational. The magnificent details and craftsmanship will only inspire a miniature artist to strive to achieve higher personal goals within their own work. While many of our artists already do outstanding work as it is, there can never be too much inspiration. This book will give that creativity a jump start.
Custom Dolls, Houses & Miniatures / CDHM