More about Faerie Houses
In general my Faerie House work falls into three basic categories:
1) Houses made on site from found materials. These are generally the most “rustic” houses. They are usually made over many hours of concentrated work using just simple hand-tools. Since they are intended to return to the earth, no glues or other artificial materials are used in their construction. To hold things together I often use thorns, porcupine quills or sometimes a bit of cotton thread. These houses are left where they are made and begin to disappear back into the landscape after the photos have been taken.
2) Houses made on site but using bits and pieces (usually doors and windows) that I have made ahead of time in the studio to add more drama or detail to the house design. If I intend to leave the studio-built features with the house when I am finished, then I make sure to create the additional items all with non-toxic materials. Again, respect for Nature is paramount.
3) Houses made fully in the studio and brought to locations for their photographs are the final category of my work. These pieces have two sub-groups: some are designed to be somewhat temporary installations but require a lot of detailed work so building ahead of time in the studio is best. However, these sculptures are quite fragile and since they may use epoxy glues etc. they are removed after the images are taken. The other category are my most highly-constructed pieces. These are very sturdy structures which are built to last. Sometimes these sculptures become available to my collectors thru my “Secret Sales”. Please see SECRET SCULPTURE SALES for more details on how to get one of these rare sculptures.
The seasonal galleries on my Faerie Houses page will show several examples of all these different kinds of constructions. In addition, I’ve added 2 more special galleries: the Stone gallery features houses constructed primarily using stone as the main material and the Studio gallery will give you a peek into some of the details and construction techniques that go into making these houses. If you want more in-depth information on HOW my houses are made, please do see my big, new BOOK, Fairy Houses published by Cool Springs Press….you can find no greater resource for building your own creations.
People often ask if I have used digital manipulations to create these images. If you had been with me when I had taken the images, you would have seen the actual sculptures in their settings just as they are depicted in the images. All the houses are real houses, not an image that has been artificially created with software. However, sometimes when I take a photo, there is something that needs to be enhanced by changing some of the exposure settings, saturation, etc. so I do use photo-processing software to bring out the best features of the image. I may also do small clean-up editing to remove a stray weed or twig to bring the focus to the beauty of the image rather than letting the eye becoming distracted by a stray dead flower or torn leaf. All the photo editing that is done has one goal in mind: to make a beautiful record of a real faerie house that I have made.