Miniature Door
Introduction: Miniature Door
I'm creating a room of miniature furnishings for the home of the mascot of a Boston bookstore that's opening in 2022. We needed a small exterior door that'll be applied at the bottom of the sidelight next to the store's front door that "the mascot uses." It needed to be squirrel-sized, and as sturdy and damage-proof as possible because it'll be exposed to the elements and children, so wood was out of the question. I decided to create the door in poured epoxy using a silicone mold, so that if it ever IS badly damaged, I can pour a new one without having to start from scratch. This build took a lot of steps, but I'm happy with how it turned out.
Supplies
Mold-making silicone
epoxy
opaque epoxy colorant
scrap wood
brass plate
ferric chloride (be safe with this stuff!)
Ooks picture hanger nail
Step 1: Creating the Mold Master
I wanted the door to echo the front door of the bookstore, and it seemed that including the trim around the door in my build would not only help the illusion, but allow the entire miniature doorway to be thicker and more sturdy.
First, I created the positive "master" for the door, which I'd use to create my flexible silicone mold. I wanted this door to have a real wood grain, so I built the master on a scrap piece of oak, orienting the grain vertically. I applied seven thin strips of oak to form the rails and stiles of the door.
It was important for this to feel as real as possible, so I knew I had to apply tiny mouldings to the inside edges of the panels. But I needed tiny mouldings for that! Using a bench scraper and a number of small files, I created a tiny scratch stock for the mouldings and clamped that to a table. I cut a thin slat of maple, chosen for its long, smooth grain, and repeatedly scraped it past the scratch stock profile until it had been scraped down to the profile I wanted. I cut the mini moulding away from the maple slat on my table saw.
Then I cut 45-degree miters on the moulding pieces and glued them in place. I wasn't overly careful about my miters because I wanted this door to feel the same age as the large door it was patterned after, and that door has seen many decades of wear and coats of paint.
After the trim moulding was in place, I added square trim around the door, leaving a small gap between them for realism. 443
Around that, I applied another, thicker custom-profile trim that I created with another scratch stock I made. When it was all in place, I sanded it gently and gave it a couple of coats of spray polyurethane to help the silicone release from the "master."
Step 2: Making the Silicone Mold
I used four pieces of scrap wood and hot glue to create a "dam" around the door / moulding master, and then mixed up a big batch of molding silicone. Pouring slowly, I filled the form to the top of the "dam."
When the silicone had set, I broke away the "dam" pieces, and carefully peeled the silicone off of the master. Peeling it away had that same satisfying feel as when you dig a knife into a fresh jar of peanut butter. The mold was clean and crisp—it had picked up every wood grain detail from the master.
I trimmed away excess bits of silicone (when they say it settles into every tiny void or crack you've left, they're not kidding).
Step 3: Creating Brass Doorknob Plate and Street Number
To make the door feel more real, it needed a brass street number plate, and a brass plate for the doorknob and keyhole. I wanted to try etching the brass, and did web research on how to do it using ferric chloride. There are lots of tutorials online—but if you're going to do it, be safe. It's nasty stuff, and you can do some real damage to yourself if you're not extremely cautious.
First, I created a pattern for my plates in Photoshop (with numbers reversed). I printed them out with my laser printer on the glossiest, thin magazine paper I could find. Note: you don't need to worry about finding a blank piece of paper--only the laser toner will transfer to the brass, not the magazine images.
I burnished a piece of ⅛" thick brass to clear the surface of any oils or other things, and give myself the smoothest base for the etching I could. I positioned my pattern face down on the brass, folded it around the stock, and taped it with metallic duct-insulation tape. 443