Hey,

Allow me to introduce Alice. She’s actually the first miniature I sculpted for the range, but I didn’t know it at the time, and I’ve only just figured out where she fits. It might be obvious you could say, but hey, it’s taken me a while to reach the obvious conclusion I don’t have a picture of the original green to hand, and I don’t have the casts either, so you’ll have to make do with the newer edited ones.

There are many interpretations of Alice out there in miniature, and I wanted to do something a little different. Way back 6 months ago (half my sculpting career ago), I sat down on the Colonial Games trade stand at a model fayre (information here), and pulled out my sculpting stuff. Over the course of the day I made a little girl with a cat. I’d just finished painting Hasslefree’s Alyx mini, one of my all time favourites, and was keen to sculpt a child for the first time.

I didn’t have a plan or a vision for her like I have with all the other minis in this range, she just sort of turned up. A little way into the day, the wonderful people from Black Cat Bases stopped to chat. That was by far the highlight of my weekend, what a genuinely wonderful couple, who, it turned out, were virtually solely responsible for the conception of the Malice range, my understanding of casting and my motivation to spend months of my life sculpting. Anyway, I digress. From talking to them, I decided to give her a cat to hold, and thus, the next 20 minutes saw the addition of a cat to keep her company. At this point she was christened ‘Girl with Cat’, and that was all fine and dandy. I had a few of them cast as I learned how to do casting, and she became the first of my minis to be ‘in print’ as it were. How wonderful! I wasn’t ever 100% happy with her, but it was such a kick to see people getting excited about her, painting and converting her, and emailing me long after I had run out of copies to see if they could get one too. I’m assembling a separate post here that showcases some of the wonderful interpretations of the miniature that people have worked on. I’m grateful to each and every one of them, regardless of the quality of the finished item, for showing me how many interpretation of one tiny mini there could be. How lovely.

So, she’s languished on my mantelpiece for a while, I haven’t painted her, largely because there is so much else to do, and I was enjoying seeing other people’s paint jobs so much, and it was only when the rest of the work in progress miniatures for Malice were sitting up there with her, that it suddenly clicked. Alice needed to be a little child. More significantly, Alice needed to be this particular little child! Why hadn’t I thought of it before? I rummaged through my boxes, and eventually found as many parts of her as I could (the casting process isn’t kind to greens!). I stuck her back together, and pulled out the ‘electric rotational tool’ (a fake cheaper Dremel – one day I’ll get and review a proper one that doesn’t rattle around in it’s casing I promise!). I used this to (shock, horror) grind off her hair around her head, particularly her fringe, her mouth, and the back of her coat. They needed re-doing to make her look right. I also need to re-do her hands (groan) – the left one is missing, no surprise there, and the right one, while looking great on the green, didn’t cast well, boo! So, I pulled out the putty and bulked it out, making it less flush with the cat’s fur.

So then, one non-fringe later, and she’s looking like this:

There is still a long way to go, but I can imagine her being led by the white rabbit somewhere mysterious, and she barely reaches the waist of Cheshire, so it really accentuates her age (or lack thereof). I’m happy with the progress so far

As always, let me know what you think, I can only improve if you tell me!

James