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House

The birdhouses began by stumbling upon a mosaic store. Not into picture frames, the birdhouse was the appropriate architectural canvas for experimentation.

It was fall, so the first project was a bigger Xmas house using broken ceramic santas on a red and green ground. With a preference to work small, the house got tiny, about 5” cubed. A Santa salt shaker broke requiring him to go down a constructed chimney. His pepper wife already her hand to chin, so she waited for his return at the window.

Then came the guesthouses and tiny words: a purple house in the Cayman Islands: Don't Worry Be Happy Bienvenidos: Mis padres tienen una casa en Tucson, Home is Where the Heart Is, Triangle D Ranch, Never Ask a Man the Size of his Spread for Raymond Adams, Mary Mary for an avid gardner. They were the perfect houseguest gift customized to pick up the details of the host's dwelling. They incorporated ceramic dimensional pieces, salt shakers, a cowboy boot, a puffy heart and other found objects.

A jewelry class introduced the pictures tiles. Picture tiles are made by encasing a 1” photocopy of a picture between two pieces of glass and silver soldering the edges to make a tile. It takes 18 images to tile a roof. More pictures, two-sided, may be dangled from the edge of the roof. These were Cowgirls, Cowboys, hunters, Women of Art, Oprah's Favorite Things.

Bling was inspired with classic costume jewelry a friend purchased for a song at the Pembroke Clothesline sale along with a few big birdhouses. One of these was used for Stand by Your Man which came to mind with a great illustrated book of the Pioneers of Country-Western music and their classic lyrics.

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• Architectural Historian
• Architectural Design
• Painting
  
  
• Illustration
  
  
• Adornment
  
  
• Chair
• House