Getting crafty

After getting up at sparrow's fart* this morning, I spent an enjoyable hour rummaging through stash and pulling out and arranging all the bird-related bits I could find:

(I do rather enjoy this part of the process, even though it sometimes makes me feel quite overwhelmed with the options I have!)

Then it was time for breakfast, and a trip to the hairdressers. As I left after my appointment, the car seemed to take on a mind of its own. And I'm sure you know what the next stop was...

Yes. Kaisercraft. *sigh* 

(I felt slightly better when I realised that my last visit was almost three months ago (if I use slightly creating counting...)

Once I returned home with my plunder it was time to start building yet another scene in an old favourite room box.

I decided that the story is that the owner of Buzz Bar Cafe took on a business partner who was, shall we say, a tad dodgy: and the once-successful business folded, leaving at least a million dollars owing to staff, staff superannuation accounts and the tax office (I may or may not have been influenced by discovering last week, when I had a hankering for a twice-baked souffle, that Autolyse had closed a couple of months ago for just that reason...).

Therefore the parameters of the new build were that the space remained basically the same (although I had thoughts of removing one of the back 'rooms' in the renovation, especially once I remembered that there were two versions of the Buzz Bar: the much larger original, and the (smaller) What's in the toybox? exhibition version. Which is the one I'm working with).

Luckily, I had versions of most of the fittings in white, so could happily agree that the new owners gave things a lick of paint to save set-up costs.

And I had some dining chairs that I'd picked up as part of a children's boxed set for $2 at a previous Canberra mini show that (although supposedly over-scale) I thought might work quite well in one-twelfth (if the legs were cut down a tad, the stickers removed and, possibly, a spot of repainting happened...) Did I mention that they were blue, and the backs had an interesting Mackintosh tea rooms/birdcage vibe happening?

At which stage I started my first round of playing with the options I had...

Should I stick with the blue of the chairs ('Bluebird cafe'?), decide that the owner replaced the floors with tiles and channelled a mix of Terence Conran, local (ex) cafe 79 & Fine (slightly ironic since the original Buzz Bar referenced another local cafe, Lonsdale Street Roasters), and the Greek islands? (This actually expands on a previous scene I made).

I tried a less busy feature wall and suddenly I was craving cheap fish and chips... Maybe not.

Or I could go in the opposite direction, decide that the refurb was done on a shoestring (and many op-shop and trash-and-treasure visits), and stick with what I'm comfortable with?

I'm thinking not, as it feels way too much like the last iteration of the Buzz Bar Cafe space.

Except I'm worried that since I now have a photo of a scene which includes a glittery guitar, a flying duck, a slightly cross-eyed owl and two fried eggs, I may completely lose interest in the whole thing.

(*Note suitably bird-like reference...)