Adding Bark to the Mouse Manor

Preparation for adding bark to the Mouse Manor

Once I created the shape of main structure with kitchen foil and masking tape I then covered the whole of the outside of the house in a layer of black tissue paper. I glued the tissue down with watered down pva glue and then gave the tissue a layer of the glue mixture on top to make it extra strong. This created a good base for the paper mache bark layer.

The next stage was to cover the mouse house with a thick layer of paper mache, I scored bark texture into the paper mache with a plastic palette knife.

Once the paper mache was dry I then gave the whole house a coat of black acrylic paint as a base for the bark colour. I then painted a layer of burnt umber acrylic paint over the black paint, I allowed some of the black paint to show through to create depth. I then dry brushed a lighter brown and a beige colour over the top.