BSC2018 Juxt's Sorcerer's cabin... you'd be ill advised to knock on the door

[Juxt]

Deep in the forests of Yokainoyama there is rumoured to live a hermit, wise in the ways of the supernatural and unreal, but despising of all mankind and their follies.  After living alone for over a hundred years with only the company of wild animals, he has gained an insight into the natural world that few can rival.  This shining beacon of knowledge and power is often sought out by the local residents for the lifting of curses or spells and the crafting of amulets, but you would be ill-advised to seek his advise, the rumours also say that he only accepts a very special form of payment for his work, perhaps one that you're unwilling to pay...

[von Lucky]

A massage from a producer?

Looking forward to seeing a step by step process of one of your creations.

[Juxt]

And so it begins!  I don't want to spoil the evolution of the project by posting any concept sketches, but I will drop a few keywords in here to get you thinking:  Onmyoji, Howl's Moving Castle, Baba Yaga, Karakasa Kozo...


I started off with a simple foamboard structure- I'm not really that bothered by how square things are for this build, I want the end result to be a bit crooked and run down so the odd off angle here and there will probably help me out.  To help hide the seams in the foamboard and add a basic texture to the model I covered the structure in heavy watercolour paper.



The whole model was stippled with an uneven mixture of liquid green stuff and stucco texture paste.  I sponged it on with a bit of blister pack foam and then gouged in a few random marks and scratches with my finger nail.



After a quick sanding to knock the bigger bumps and spikey bits from the stucco, I built up some wooden panels from various bits of wood I had hanging around (I'm trying not to spend any money at all on this build, everything has to come from my stash)  I used a mixture of veneer inlay wood, balsa wood, a broken bamboo hand fan, coffee stirrers- anything spare and wooden.



At this point I realised that the first level of my house was starting to look too square and symmetrical so I threw on a quick and hasty extension with a bark shingle roof.



Here you can see the start of my first experiment with joists to support a thatched roof.  After raising a square section in the middle of the roof I extended some matchsticks at an approximate angle...



...and layered on some boards cut from the ribs of a broken bamboo fan (I may as well use Japanese materials for a Japanese build right?)



I left the roof removable for now so I can sculpt thatch on it and reach the undersides easily... All I need to do now is find the bravery to start sculpting 

[von Lucky]

Oh - that's a great start!

[Constable Bertrand]

nice timber work so far 

Cheers
Matt

[ichwillauch]

a great looking house

[Juxt]

Thanks guys

Nearly every Japanese building of size requires a raised platform to keep the wooden structure from rotting away on the wet ground, now seemed like the right time to build mine and set the final footprint.  It's just a piece of foamboard edged in coffee stirrers and then planked on the top face.  I'm undecided if I'll need to plank the underside of it, and I still need to build the supporting legs and some kind of hand rail.



The ground floor of the building sits quite comfortably off-centre on the platform- the two doorways having the most space around them, while the side and rear of the build wouldn't see much traffic or require a real walkway.



I topped the roof of the ground floor with another foamboard structure.  Again, wrapped in watercolour paper and textured the same as the other floor.  I'm yet to decide what wooden panelling will or won't be on this floor, almost certainly some windows are needed.  This floor is intentionally off centre- it will eventually be supported by a crude buttress made from bamboo I think- although it isn't as crooked as the picture appears.



Another roof and tiny room as before, this time marking out the final height of the building itself, although the rest of the build will bring the top of the roof another 8" higher up than it is now


almost time for the interesting stuff to start, almost 

[Mason]

Blimey, this really is taking shape nicely.
 

It is also certainly going to be a much more imposing piece than I had in mind at first, certainly not just a 'cabin in the woods'.
I really do not think that the curious should be knocking on that door.
 

[Juxt]

It's only going to get bigger once I work out how to give it legs

[Mason]

 

Brilliant!
 

[von Lucky]

Awesome. Are those 1:1 chicken claws?!

[Juxt]

Awesome. Are those 1:1 chicken claws?!

Yep!    Pewter hawk feet intended for taxidermy use.  They have some awful mould lines which'll need working over, and the rest of the legs will need sculpting somehow.  Really nice bits though, and they make them for all size birds from little songbirds up to big birds of prey.

[Vanvlak]

Whoa! The hut on fowl's legs! 

[Andym]

Whoa! The hut on fowl's legs! 

You don’t get much more ill-advised than that!

[tomrommel1]

nice idea