They sent an email last night...

"Our shop roombox competition closed on 28th February and we were delighted at both the number and quality of the entries we received. Entries came from 7 different countries and 3 different continents and judging was a very difficult task. We would like to make special mention of following entries which are Highly Commended -Jackie Gilchrist (UK), Claudia Lezza (Italy), Keli Minick (USA), Rose O Donovan (Ireland), Valerio & Vittorio Ruschetta (Italy) . The winner is Caroline Hemmings (UK) for her replica of a traditional J Sainsbury grocery store. Caroline made all the furniture and more than 500 food items as well as the clothes for the shop asistant and customer. We were very impressed at the quality of her workmanship and her thriftiness in using cuttings from old magazines, coloured foil from sweet wrappers and wooden stirrers from fast food restaurants! Please take a look at all the entries on our Facebook page."

Awww, I'm highly commended.  Makes me smile :)

My shipment didn't come in the mail.  I made do by painting some lids on the bottle blanks, then cutting some temporary labels from vintage postage stamps, which are applied with double-stick tape. 

These are the pictures I used to enter the contest.

 

I just came in from the mailbox...I still haven't received the third shipment which will finish the pub. The due date for the first contest is the 31st, today is the 29th. There will be no mail tomorrow, so unless the rest of the supplies arrive Monday afternoon and I can get the pub finished and photographed that evening, entering the first contest is out. Unless...do you think the pub looks complete enough to enter as is?

The second shipment of goodies arrived yesterday...I'm hoping the third will arrive this afternoon.

My shelves are practically full already, which means I bought too many bottles...but since I can move the small ones to my half scale houses that's okay.

I particularly like the glass of scotch on the rocks and the jar of pickled eggs.

Before I glue the bottles to the shelves I have to take some pictures of this stuff in my house, the size difference is hysterical.  I must say that 1:12 is a lot easier to work in than 1:24 is.

A close-up of the cork floor, because someone on facebook wants to see.  The darker cork is the floor and had been treated with several coats of tung oil varnish.  The lighter cork is untreated, still on the roll, spread out on my worktable for comparison.  (Click on the picture to enlarge it.)

The mailman didn't bring any boxes of miniatures yesterday, so I had nothing to do last night except turn on the television.  I suppose I should have cleaned my studio, but....

Neither of the two shipments I'm waiting for arrived yesterday :(

Framing and putting up the artwork didn't take long, I was hoping to have something else to work on when I finished that. 

I need to find some stuff to put on the top shelf at the bottom left corner of the photograph, there's still some glue smear visible.

Hopefully the mailman will be good to me today so I have something to do this evening...though after looking at this picture it's obvious I should vacuum the box out before I start filling it with stuff...and that I should really stop using q-tips as tools, they're just too messy.

It's almost done, it just needs a light and the rest of the stuff to fill it....and I think I'm going to put an awning over the front window. 

The mirrored back won't be so obnoxious when the shelves are full, hopefully.

There is a big glue goober smear from the scotch glasses that came in the box on the back wall above the bar so I'm going to use the artwork to cover it.  The black and white group photo I printed from Glenmorangie's website, I thought it would be a neat way to tie the bar back to the box it's housed in.  The advertising poster on the bottom of the mirror is for Glenmorangie as well.  I'll work on framing and hanging them this evening.

I'm proud of myself for using up leftover building supplies with this project. The only purchases I made were for items to fill the bar, and that's because I usually work in 1:24 scale but built the bar in 1:12, so nothing in my stash of accessories would fit.   All the wood, leather and paper came from my stash.  Susan, you should notice three of those as leftover from your Halloween projects.

I took a picture of the shelving unit build in progress in case anyone is interested.  I didn't want visible shelf supports so I built the unit in two layers, overlapping the joins...lego style.  It took longer, but it looks exactly how I wanted.

I finished the stools and made the brass rail for the bar yesterday morning.  The piece of brass rod I was planning to use is too narrow (because I bought it to use as pipes in the Fairfield's half scale bathroom) so I painted a piece of dowel instead.  I also added door pulls to the base of the back-bar, since I've decided to keep it the height it is even if the top shelf will be higher on the wall than I originally planned...I'm in agreement with Casey that if I shorten it so that it won't be seen there isn't much point in having it there.

I thought I was done for the weekend but the first shipment of bottles arrived in the afternoon mail, so I'll be able to build the shelves for the back-bar today.

The sketch I made that has the shelving measurements on it has disappeared...I wanted to lay the bottles on top of the sketch to see how accurate my estimates are.  Perhaps I'll find it when I clean off my work table this morning, if not I'll have to measure everything again.

I'm disappointed that some of the bottles don't sit straight.  It seems to me that if you're going to manufacture an item for sale that you ought to have enough pride to make sure it's made well.  I hate to have to fix things I've paid hard earned money for.

More work on the bar...

I ended up using a red leather for the top of the bar, instead of one of the samples I showed you earlier.  The brown on the front of the bar isn't leather, but ostrich leather patterned paper...the only patterned paper I had in my stash that looked right.

I started covering the seats of the stools, but I'm not liking the tan suede at all.  I've got a thin black faux leather fabric that's been in my stash for years, I'm going to try that instead.

I'd like to build the shelves for the back-bar this weekend, but I don't think it's a good idea until after the bottles that will go on them arrive.  I want to double-check the dimensions before I start...don't want to waste time and material building shelves that could turn out to be too short to put bottles on.