Giveaway Dragon - Violet

Violet is on her long journey over the ocean to her new owner. Sara was our giveaway winner and she chose a custom baby dragon! 

Violet is a gorgeous purple merino wool with a pastel pink New Zealand Corridale belly. She was felted over a strong wire armature. Her claws and horns are merino wool and her wings are fantasy film over wire that has been sealed. Violet has beautiful blue Swarovski crystal eyes.

Violet is looking forward to her new home and can't wait to be loved! If you want your very own custom baby dragon, contact me and I can make whatever you like. I put new baby dragons up for adoption in my Etsy shop from time to time, or you can purchase directly from me via my Facebook fan page or email.

xo,

Irma

Custom: Death Pony & Fae

My Little Pwny

I've been working on some custom orders this week and have completed two so far. First is Death Pony the Apocalypse Pony. This was taken from a sketch from Robot Chicken as mentioned in my previous posts.

Death Pony is needle felted over a wire armature with a washed wool core. The top layer is New Zealand Corriedale wool. The mane and tail are mulberry silk that has been hand rooted. Garnet Swarovski crystal eyes that blaze in the light give this figure an eerie look. Chain necklace and crystal detailing with "666" brand felted in white merino.

The mask is sculpted in paperclay and is removable. It has been painted in metallic silver acrylic paint and coated in satin varnish.

Fae is a baby dragon order where my amazing customer let me do my own thing. Fae is needle felted over a wire armature in mint New Zealand Corriedale wool. Her belly is lilac New Zealand Corriedale wool, and her tiny horns, claws and teeth are felted.

Her wings are fantasy film over wire and are sealed. Fae has gorgeous yellow glass eyes.

These dolls are not available to purchase but you can order your own custom doll.

xo,

Irma

Upcoming projects

My little pony.

Hi everyone! I've had a much needed unwind after Ludo and have started thinking about what I want to make next. I have a constantly growing and evolving list of things I would like to make. I get an idea in my head and by the time I finish what I am doing, I have six more ideas in place of the last one.

I now keep a running list of the creatures I want to make in my desktop as well as in my phone. I'll be minding my own business doing something mundane and suddenly something painfully adorable or awesome will pop into my head.

For right now, I am working on a special request for my brother Michael. The armature and core are pictured above. This will be Death Pony the Apocalypse Pony from Robot Chicken. If you don't know what Robot Chicken is, it is a hilarious show on Adult Swim on Cartoon Network in the US. It is full of stop-motion animated shorts using action figures and toys (mostly from the 80's). Definitely not for the faint of heart, so don't blame me if you go looking for it and find it offensive.  :)

I am also working on a custom baby dragon that my lovely customer has given me 100% artistic and creative freedom on. Tentatively named "Fae" it is a beautiful pastel light green dragon that will have a soft heather purple underbelly and yellow glass eyes.

 

Do you recognize any of the pieces above? Left to right: Beau, Lucille, TBD, Jasmine, Mia, Tree of Life

Many moons ago, an acquaintance commissioned a piece from me to make a Tree of Life druid form from World of Warcraft. They backed out after I started work on the piece due to finances and it has been sitting at my workspace ever since. This was a lesson learned about how to run my business/hobby, but now I really want to finish it--if only to get it out of my workspace and into a loving home. Maybe before the end of this year?

 Tree of Life armature.

Stuff I really want to make and will most likely start on in the coming weeks:

-A classic garden gnome. I love gnomes. LOVE them. I want to make the quintessential garden gnome. Red hat, blue coat, long white beard.

-An angora rabbit. I got some really gorgeous local merino/angora blend fiber and some pure angora fiber. What could possibly be more fitting than to make a bunny?

-Dragons. I've got a few in mind, but one sticks out the most in my mind's eye. With all this beautiful white fiber I have now, I was thinking of making a big pure white dragon with wet felted wings. I've also been itching to make a sea dragon, water dragon, serpent of some sort. It will happen :)

-A snowy owl. A lot of times when I am making one thing, it evolves into another thing altogether or gives me an idea for something else. When making Heaven's head, I saw a strong resemblance to a snowy owl...so this has been on my list for a wee while.

So I'm off to work and will post photos of pieces as they are completed. If you have a special request in mind or would like to see me make something, drop me a line or leave a comment below.

xo,

Irma

Fairyspit featured in the Etsy Storque!

I am absolutely thrilled, pleased, ecstatic, and lots of other adjectives to announce that I was featured in the Etsy Storque!

Sheila was featured among other great items by very talented artisans from Down Under in Etsy Finds: Upside Down. Check out this amazing collection of items.

Thank you and welcome to all of my new customers and fans gained from this showcase. Your dolls are on the way!

~Irma

Now on Ebay: Falkor the Luck Dragon Doll (Relisted)

RELISTED- 3 day auction only. Closes Monday July 26, 2010.

Falkor is now available to purchase on Ebay. Please pass along to anyone you think might be interested and happy bidding!

Micro Baby Dragon Missy

This absolutely tiny baby dragon is only 1 1/4 inches tall! She is made of hot pink/magenta New Zealand Romney wool. Her belly is mulberry silk and her horns are New Zealand Alpaca. Her tiny eyes are hematite coloured seed beads.

Her wings are something new for me. They are made of artist's grade shrink plastic that are hand coloured with coloured pencils and gel pen.

Missy would make a great pocket dragon to bring you luck. If you like, I can attach her to a black satin cord to be worn as a necklace at no charge.

Missy will come to you in an organza bag with a signed and dated tag.

Now available in my Etsy shop!

Falkor the Luck Dragon Art Doll

"Leaving so soon? Hmmmm?"

Atreyu stammers "I was just going to..."

"...Sneak away? I like children."

"For breakfast?"

and that booming laugh.

"Never. I'm a luck dragon. My name is Falkor."

I present Falkor the Luck Dragon from The NeverEnding Story. Falkor is my most ambitious project to date and has been a labour of love. Many, many hours have gone into his creation as I worked on him for 2-6 hours a day over a period of three weeks.

His body is firmly felted over a strong wire armature with a core of merino wool and over that is a layer of snow white merino/silk (80/20).

Falkor's scales are hundreds of glass seed beads, iridescent beads, frosted beads and natural New Zealand shell beads that were individually sewn in.

Once his beadwork was complete, I carefully hand rooted his coat of "fur" with mulberry silk in very small sections to make his coat natural and uniform.

Falkor's claws are sculpted of paperclay and were painted with a shimmery white acryic paint and finished with a satin finish waterbase varnish.

His eyes are acrylic gold doll eyes that have been carefully set.

Falkor is 11 1/4 inches long and 1 3/4 inches tall. He can be posed gently.

Falkor will come to you with a signed and dated tag.

To see Falkor come to life, view his work in progress post.

More photos on my Facebook Fan page.

 

Falkor has been SOLD, but a custom order is always available.

Falkor: Work in Progress (UPDATED July 11!)

***Scroll to the bottom of the post for updates!***

Falkor has been coming along great. I have his body completely finished and fleshed out. Today I started the very long process of applying all of the beadwork for his scales.

Here is his body. I felted a firm core of merino wool over a strong wire armature. I then applied another layer of merino/silk (80/20) over that to make his colour uniform.

After fleshing the body, I felted his paws. I have yet to make his claws, which I am sculpting of paperclay.

I have not yet attached his head. I am waiting to complete the scales and will then attach his head and add his adorable long floppy ears. This will be done right before I add his coat of luxurious mulberry silk.

His head and face came out perfect. I spent hours poring over the internet looking for good movie stills and YouTube videos. I wanted to capture every single feature on his face to recreate his expression in wool.

Here is the beadwork I have done so far. I have sewn on hundreds of clear and iridescent glass seed beads. I also bought some cream coloured glass pearls and some gorgeous cream/iridescent New Zealand shell beads. I am still trying how I am going to incorporate them in and transition from the clear to cream.

It is very hard to capture how this looks in a photograph, but here is a portion of the tail that I have completed. I have many more hours of sewing to go and then the hard part: felting in tiny sections of mulberry silk, trimming to the proper lengths and rooting it properly.

What do you think of Falkor so far?


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Update 5/7/10 (New Zealand Time)

I've got most of the beadwork done and attached his head. I've also added more definition to his face. Here are some pics of the additional work done:

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Updated 6 July

Today I started hand rooting Falkor's silk coat. This is very labour intensive, but worth every minute!

 

 

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UPDATED 7 July

Slow going, but still happy with the direction I chose to take with this piece. I suppose I could have just felted everything and called it a day, but I really wanted to make this as true to the original as possible.

Here is a quick tutorial on how to root fibre. I am using this technique to add Falkor's fur. It is a very time consuming process which is why this will take me a few days to finish.

First, take a small length of fibre. I am using mulberry silk as fur in this instance. I am using about 1/4" widths or less.

Next, root the fibre in. I find that a fine needle like a 40 triangle works best for this. You want to place the end where you want it to be rooted. Felt in against the edge, leaving the rest loose. Do not felt any more than the edge. Think of your scalp :)

Gently give it a tug once you have felted the edge in. If fibres start to pull away, go back and felt them in a little more.

Once you have made sure it is felted in securely, cut away the remaining length. I cut it on a diagonal and in different directions for a more natural layered look, rather than cutting straight across.

Gently comb the section with your needle, spreading it out to make the fur uniform with the rest. Repeat the whole process from step 1, moving up a few millimeters each time so there are no gaps and the fur looks full and natural.

After several hours, I am 2 1/2 inches up his tail.  Be patient and take your time for good results. 

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UPDATED 10 JULY

I've been ill the last couple of days so I haven't finished Falkor yet. I am hoping to have him done tomorrow or Monday at the latest.  Still about a good 4 hours of work to be done as far as scales on his neck, rooting the fur on his neck and face, making and attaching his ears and attaching and painting his claws.

Rooting his fur has taken me a few days as this is really detailed work that is labour intensive. Here are some shots to show his progress so far.

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UPDATED 11 JULY

Falkor is just about completed. His claws have cured and I will attach them tonight and paint them tomorrow and that is it. This journey has lasted me much much longer than my originally anticipated 30 hours. I would put the work completed at around 70-90 hours. I have no way of knowing. I spent 2-8 hours a day on him (4 hours today alone). So here are pics of him completed. His glamour shots are to follow in his "completed" post.

 

What do you think? I have been toying with just opening his other eye. Maybe it is because I have been staring at him for three weeks. I have lost all objectivity in this project. :)