INTRODUCTION
I
am pleased to share with you my passion for miniatures and my love of
plants!
My
passion began when I was a miniature myself, not yet in
school, instilled by my mother, Virginia Mohler. A
very
talented and resourceful woman, she made what she could not afford to
buy, or could not find. My
very first miniature was a yellow rosebud flannel
nightgown Mom made
for my Minnie Mouse doll to match the one she made for me. It may have been a larger scale, but a miniature version,
nonetheless.
My
fortune was to have an older sister, and our dollhouse arrived shortly
after Minnie Mouse. Mom began our
collection at Marshall Field's in Chicago with rooms of
Toncoss
furniture, yet something was lacking. The bedroom was not
complete until she hooked a wool rug and made a cozy ruffled chair with
co-ordinating throw pillows. The warm summer sun (from a lamp
with a tilted shade sitting on the floor) filtered through her lace
kitchen
curtains and a slight breeze (from a black Diehl fan perched on the
piano and
pointing downward) blew through her handmade screen door onto the
decorated birthday cake (made from a spool of thread) sitting on the
table. Before long, an
empty shell had become a cozy home full of handmade, one of a kind
treasures, making me wish I could shrink small enough to live in a
house with a canopied bed, a fireplace, and a dog!
I
watched in awe as my Mother continued to make more and more
accessories, eventually selling them to Marshall Field's and several
miniature distributors. I attempted to emulate her, until
high
school took
center
stage. Not until Mom opened a miniature shop in Illinois,
called
Gullivers, did the miniature bug bite again. I began making
limited
accessories while attending college in Boulder, Colorado, eventually
trying my hand at houseplants,
likely influenced by the forty houseplants in my small house.
By
the early 1980's I was selling my plants though mail order and at shows
in Denver and Chicago. In 1987 I was published in the
November
issue of Nutshell News. By 1999, my growing family no longer
allowed me the time and space I needed for miniatures, and they were
packed away (the miniatures, not my family).
Many
years have passed and I have killed all but two of the
original plants
I miniaturized long ago. My home is still full of
houseplants,
and the new varieties are screaming to become miniaturized before
I kill them, too! I did venture into the great outdoors and added
Hostas, Ostrich Ferns, and more Cactus to my repetoire. Between the new and the old, and the
indoor and outdoor plants, I received the Artisan and Fellow
Awards from the International Guild of Miniature Artisans.
Please
browse my Gallery and the Shop and Hostas pages, and thank you for visiting!
Carolyn
Mohler Kraft
Copyright 2024, Carolyn Mohler
Kraft