Unintended consequences....

I discovered this morning that during its two years of storage, the lift-off shop front has partially broken away from its base, so I've had to re-glue it and attempt to repair and strengthen the splintered section. 

A minor setback, and probably not the last.

I've been thinking more about the exterior decoration of the building, and how to achieve the overall look of a lithographed doll's house.  Every doll's house I've ever built (and over the past 35+ years there have been many), I've strived for realism, inside and out, but I want this little half scale shop/house to look like a Bliss-style house, which requires a very different approach.

I had already printed out some sheets of Ashlar blocks for the facade of the ground floor, but they were on plain buff-coloured card and looked very flat and uninspiring.  So yesterday I spent hours making a new sheet, using Photoshop to create subtly different coloured blocks, similar to the ones in the image above.

I'm undecided about whether to 'age' them so I'll wait till I've completed the front before committing.  They do still look rather flat and featureless as they are, but when they're in situ they should look better.  In any case, I'd have to practice on some scraps to refine the technique as it would pain me to mess it up.

I've also been searching for suitable frieze sections to use on the front and round the sides and have found a good selection online, some of which might work well.  I'm also going to use some around the edges of the internal floors, to echo the outside decoration.

Finally today, I made more windows for the sides of the building. 

I used the original windows as templates and cut more from thin card.  then I glued several together to make thicker window frames.

I thought that I might do something similar to those in the photo, with coloured card in the top sections and paper curtains in the bottom.  However, using card in the front section, where there are window openings, would block any light from the inside, so perhaps tissue paper would be better.  I'll have to experiment to see what works best.

All in all, not a bad start over the past few days.  Let's see if can maintain the momentum...