Interview: Jan Adams, Third Owner of Magpie Models

Jan Adams purchased Magpie Models in 2002 and opened for business in 2003. She has very kindly granted us an interview about her time with Magpie.

Craft Time: Painting the Stone

The trick to getting a nice stone effect is watery, blotchy layers. You're going to need a coarse paint brush, a small dish, water (I use a small water bottle as I'm less likely to knock it over and destroy all of my work), and some acrylic paint in stoney colours.

Craft Time: Cheap and Easy Stone Effect

In Scotland, rough stone barns, buildings, and walls are a common sight. My props and accessories tend to reflect my current location, so things have become rather stony in the Horse Room.

I started this building several years ago with the idea of it being a barn which had been converted into a tack and feed shop. Somewhere along the line it turned into an antique store instead. While I had built the structure, plastered the walls, and put in a stone floor, I never finished the interior or even started the exterior.

I thought it was time to finally finish this project and I thought others might enjoy seeing my process, and possibly trying it for themselves. The barn was built with wood from the scrap bin at B&Q with balsa wood accents, and put together with hot glue. My husband has a very rude term for my carpentry skills, but they work well enough for my purposes. To paraphrase my sculpture professor, wood putty will hide a world of sins.

Silverado: The pony, the legend

Please pardon the quality of the pictures, they were taken around 1999 with a video camera. I can't get to my old photos easily these days

In 1994, when I was twelve, my riding stable got a new lesson horse. He was small, chunky, and decidedly weird looking compared to the other residents of our stable, which were mostly stock horses in solid dark colours with the occasional pinto or blanket appaloosa. Sil was white with blackish grey smudges, bright pink, freckly nose and eyes... and other areas, a wispy salt & pepper tail, and a funny short mane which stuck up like a push broom, and this silly puffball of a forelock. He stuck out like a clown at a wedding.

Hairing With Mohair - Part 2, Installation

Once you have the hair swatches made, installation is pretty straight-forward. The method shown below is for a closed shell. Open shell installation is the same as that for nylon hair, though you could get away with using PVA or Tacky glue instead of the hot glue.

Supplies:

• Hair swatches (two of around 4-6 inches wide)
• Scissors
• Toothpicks
• Glue (in something with a fairly fine point)

Hairing with Mohair - Part 1, Making the Hair Swatches

Everyone has their own technique for hairing a model, this is the process I use.

Supplies:

• Mohair (I buy mine from Horsing Around)
• Glue (PVA or Tacky)
• Rigid plastic sheet of some sort (I use take-away box lids)
• Scissors
• Something to spread glue - popsicle stick or plastic glue spready thing (you can find them in the children's art section in many stores)

What Scale is a Magpie?

Magpie Model Horses are generally considered 1:12 scale, which means 1 inch in miniature scale equals 12 inches in real world scale... ideally. In the model horse and the dollhouse worlds, 1:12 scale often covers a bit of a range.

The horses below are all considered 1:12 scale models, but you can see what a difference there is not just in height, but in the scale of the sculptures.

There is even a certain amount of inconsistency in scale between individuals within their own brand. I'm not saying this as criticism, I am an avid collector of all of these models, but just to illustrate how loosely we throw about the 1:12 scale label.

Julips, by nature of their materials are on a slightly more massive scale as their legs cannot be too fine as it causes production difficulties due to their leg wires and overall weight of their bodies, and the latex tends to give the sculptures a soft, pony-ish look. Plastic models have more leeway in this area as they do not flex and are made of a lighter material. So a Julip model of the same general size and even breed type can look like a larger scale pony rather than a smaller scale sport or light breed.