Village Creations

By Kevin Blakeney

A little about the village display artist: I have worked at a retail Christmas store since 2001 creating displays for their Department 56 collections. I started creating these displays in private residences when customers wanted displays similar to what they saw in the store. Thus, Village Creations Inc. was created and the rest is history.

This is a small display fit onto a window seat using Dept. 56 Snow Village pieces. Using Hot Wire Foam Factory tools, we were able to create a three dimensional mountain backdrop as well as the various elevations.

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This large Dickens’ Village display is located in Zender’s Christmas Showplace in Thousand Oaks, California. The trestle bridge featured on the platform was carved out of one piece of 6″ thick Styrofoam and then faux painted to appear old and weathered. Scale bricks were cut out and glued on to finish the “peeling plaster” appearance.

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This is a 3′ by 3′ display we created to fit on top of an existing coffee table. Because size was limited we needed to create various levels to allow buildings to be seen above the encircling train. Using the Sculpting Tool, we were able to create rock and mountainous outcroppings perfect for this New England Village display.

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This mantle display was one of our earliest jobs. The edging was created using the Sculpting Tool again to create snow drifts in front. A waterfall and river was created using the same tool.

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This is one of our largest projects to date. This Dickens’ Village display is 9′ by 5′ and has over 45 buildings. We carved tunnels to allow for a scale train and created rock work on the front of the cliff. All elevations were created using a combination of the Sculpting Tool and the Hot Knife.