Mannequin Make-over - from Ugly to Fun

This room is an inspiration (idea) room.  Part of a display in a local home that is an idea house.  I have been working in my mind on our master bedroom redesign and the colors you see here is very much what I've had in my plan.  However, the real inspiration piece I'd like to talk about today is the mannequin on the right in this photo.

You see last week, my friend, Carolyn had spotted this mannequin at a local antique shop and had given me a heads up about it.  The day I went to view it, the shop was having a storewide 20% off sale.  She was quite dusty, lop sided, wobbly and of needing some tlc.  I've been looking for mannequins to feature my jewelry for quite some time, and the price was quite good too.  Thus she is now part of my display props for my jewelry business.  However, she needed a make-over badly.  What to do?

Weapons of choice... I mean tools of the trade, used on my make-over.

I bought this Friday, and viewed the idea home on Sunday.  A light bulb moment for sure...

Do you see a resemblance between the two mannequins?  I did, so away I started to working on removing her ghastly overlay that was quite outdated.

Have you ever looked inside one of these ladies?  They are filled with hinges and screws.

I had to remove portions completely in order to fully remove the outer layers of fabric, but when I was done with each section, it was a small victory.  It took about 4 hours of tedious work to remove the fabric and put her back together again.

Here she is partially dismantled.

This photo shows all of the bluish/purple stretchy material removed, but the black fabric is still intact.  This is what I first thought I'd do, but I didn't like the condition (dirty) the black material was in.

I also didn't like how distracting the black fabric was when trying to photograph my jewelry, either, thus I began the process of removing the black fabric as well.

Here I'm removing the fabric.  The bent nose needle nose plier was invaluable, as was the scissor on most of the fabric removal.  I only used the exacto knife for removal of the black portion of fabric, as I already had the mannequin tightly fit together and would of had to take it all apart again without it.

Yeayyyy!  The finish results...and I'm quite happy with them.

My latest "White Wednesday" jewelry design.

Lots of fun details, and I'm loving photographing on this lady.

Beach theme necklace...

Lots of fun surprises and treasures make up this necklace.

More unique pieces collaborate to make this one of my all time favorite designs.

This is the back side portion of the necklace.  Details flow throughout the piece and is something I always strive to do with each of my one-of-a-kind designs.

Thanks for visiting me on this "White Wednesday" event and for taking the time to read my lengthy post.  The name I've chosen is Carolina, as my dear friend, Carolyn is whom found her for me.

This necklace, as well as others from my Mimi-Toria's Jewelry line will be available at the upcoming Remnants Of The Past event in California in Sue Whitneys booth.   The show is this coming week-end, April 24th from 9-4 pm in Nipomo, CA.    The remaining pieces will come back to Minnesota and be offered along with many other designs at the Arts+Architecture/Junk Market Style show/event being held in Minnesota in May from the 5-9th.  Check out the website and won't you plan to join us?  We'd love it if you can.

I am linking this up to Thrifty Tuesdays event, as everything used in this blog post was found while thrifting.  Thank you to Linda for hosting this fun event.
Thanks once again Kathleen of Faded Charm for hosting the White Wednesday party which I linked up to, and to Suzanne, the Colorado Lady, and her blog which I'm linking up to for the first time for her Vintage Thingies Thursdays she hosts.  Be sure to check out all of the rest of these blog parties participants, and leave a comment for them.
I am also linking up with Kristin Duke through her blog "The Idea Room".


Also, linking up with Trash to Treasure Tuesday for the first time.