The Horrid Hollow

Aww rest in peace Maggie Smith you absolute legend! Such sad news.. too many amazing roles to count!

Eeeeeee 😁 who's getting excited, and who's dressing up in their best Halloween 🎃 costume 👌🙏 not long now guys until we kick off the Halloween 👻 season for real 💥
DO NOT MISS THIS EPIC HALLOWEEN MARKET 👻
Over 70 Alternative traders 😲
Oak Park Active Living Centre 10.30am to 3.30pm
FREE ENTRY 🚫 FREE PARKING 🅿️

Morning!
I can’t wait to share all the new characters sat in the cottage, including some new little hanging Worry Witches!

My snotty nose became a nasty ear and throat infection 😩 my ears have been so super itchy my sculpting tools were looking quite appealing for a damn good scratch and poke about in my ear canal … but I settled for ear drops instead!

So, a slight set back but stock is indeed piling up for next weeks event which I am unbelievably excited for!

I’m sat amongst ghosts, mandrakes, shrooms, witches, pumpkins, curio units.. bottles… wow… I have sooo many bottles and oh I didn’t tell you about my new witch gift tags.. so much to share with you so sit tight and hold on to your pants I am hoping for the Horrid Hollows best stall ever!

Feeling a tad snot laden this morning… which is not part of my tremendously busy and ghoulish plans for the day. So, tissues in one hand and a hot brew of honey and garlic in the other… here’s to hoping my nose clears as quickly as my misty cottage windows did this morning…

Fingers crossed… well…imp fingers anyway!

Morning from The Horrid Hollow and what a lovely somber, crisp misty morning it is!
On venturing out to my ‘cottage’ and finding the whole garden in an arachnid adorned spectacular, with thick white dewy webs, I decided on dragging the hoover out to the ‘cottage’ for spruce!
The wonders of nature can stay on the other side of the door thank you very much!
As you can see my yoghurt and honey breakfast is now in session amongst dead shroomies and pumpkins and other sculpted weirdos. I have bottles and jars stacking up too. I have designed some great new labels for this Halloween! Lucem Protego Nosferatu (Vampire sun screen), Lost Words, Ghost Farts and Black of Night to name but a few!
Not only have I been working my boots off but I have sourced some great new props and display pieces for my stall at the Darkside Market in October!
Excited for what is to come is an understatement!

Hardly a L’Oréal advert!
Just 3 old crones awaiting their fashionable witches attire!
Meet these and more creepy and curious characters 6 October Oak Park Walsall Wood!

https://facebook.com/events/s/darkside-markets-auld-omens-ha/490662510206908/

Quietly sat in my witchy cottage, soothing camomile in hand, listening to the rain patter on my roof like the feet of an angry swarm of piskies and enjoying the grey gloom of that melancholy sky. The wind whistling through the gap in the door and the remains of summer flowers shaking through their stems outside. Back garden gates swinging- creaking as if they’re laughing over the summer that has sailed by and the marvellously moody days to come.
I’m pausing for a moment, sipping my tea, pondering over the witches heads, pumpkin stacks, ghosts, shrooms and strewn imp fingers.. contemplating over not just the huge mega Halloween spectacular of an event that The Horrid Hollow will be attending in just a few short weeks time.. but also.. what will I wear to such an occasion?!!
The Horrid Hollow will be at Oak Park Walsall Wood October 6th for what promises to be an amazeballs for eyeballs!!
I have been busily sculpting and doodling and working on a weird and wonderful stall all for the benefit of the weird and wonderful folk and curious creepy crowds alike!
Bring on the wind, the fallen leaves and the shift in the shadows, autumn is coming and with it a Darkside Markets and Auld Omen Halloween Edition event!!
https://www.facebook.com/share/JXHmADuJq1M2W71T/?mibextid=LQQJ4d

Nipped out for a walk around our local cemetery today, crunching fallen leaves under foot, the sound of boisterous jackdaws, cooler air and and drizzly rain and fresh fish and chips… autumn feels just around the corner… I can’t wait!

So, the very dapper Dandelion is looking for a home. He is a Horrid Hollow original character hand sculpted and painted and sat inside his glass dome with hand stained base.
Was £65 now £60

***SOLD***
Shroomies £20 posted within the UK x

Small Leather Books
Hand sewn leather books beautifully stained in the most gorgeous green colour and all wrapped up with small pressed flowers. Blank paper inside for all your note taking, fairy spotting and doodles
£10 each including UK P&P

Worry Gnomes
£10 including UK P&P

***SOLD***
Acantha’s Apothecary Cabinet
Beautiful vintage display cabinet with fern backdrop and nearly 30 bottles and jars of magical mayhem and enchanted delights. Bottles include Deadly Nightshade, Willo- the- Wisp, Wishful Thinking and Goblin Worming tablets not to mention a micro mandrake bell jar.
£65 x

The Sea Monkey is looking for a loving home!
All hand sculpted and painted original character sat amongst the corals on a hand stained wooden plinth. £100 x

The Botanical Beasties!
These little shadow boxes are home to the Botanical Beasties - hand drawn characters amongst hand cut flowers from old vintage books (I only use damaged books😉🥰) creating a 3D effect.
These original characters are handrawn with pencil and inks and are sat inside hand stained shadow box frames
£35 each with UK P&P

Morning!
Unable to attend a craft event today I thought I’d pop some of my recent creations on here for you to have a nosey. If anything catches your eye please feel free to pop me a message x
Have a great weekend x

***SOLD***
This beauty is looking for a home!

Agatha Van Cacklebaum’s Curiosity Apothecary!

There is a very handsome hand sculpted mandrake sat upon Agatha’s shelf, amongst 24 miniature bottles and jars all with handmade labels you will only find at the Horrid Hollow.
Potions such as Will -O- the Wisp, Wishful Thinking, Liquid Moonlight and those wonderful renown Goblin Worming Tablets bringing relief from all botty parasites for goblins, brownies and Imps a like! Potions and elixirs eagerly laying in wait for some enchanted interlude!
There’s crystals, keys, 2 handmade leather books, a skull, plants, crystal ball, eyeball, hand painted beetle, and hand sculpted fairy bones and toadstools, all waiting for magical mayhem to ensue!

Who will be the new owner of Agatha Van Cacklebaum’s Curiosity Apothecary?!

Was £75 is now £65 excluding UK P&P x

When you’ve been sculpting a Sea Monkey and lay him down for a moment only to realise he looks like he’s hitting on you 🤣

Boxed Flower Nymphs
Hand sculpted and hand painted creatures inside stained wooden display boxes £40 each including UK P&P x

Hello from the Horrid Hollow.
Apologies for the void, things have been a little slow lately. I am unsure if it’s an age thing but eczema is plaguing my hands and arms off late which makes using certain products a tad difficult.
Anyway, the rain has been calling me out to my cottage this week- the sound is awesome on the roof, that coupled with noisy jackdaws squabbling over bread crusts and stale cake!
I appear to be sat amongst many projects, my creative brain a hive of exciting things for the summer months! Currently finding myself getting better acquainted with a sculpted jackalope and this baby mandragora. I also have some fun new little characters coming together in the form of 3D paper projects who are known as the Botanical Beasties!
Lots to share with you horrid collectors and followers over the next few weeks x

The Dandelion is looking for a home.
Nestled inside a beautiful glass dome of 21cm high and 15cm in diameter sits this very cheery chap waiting for his new curios creature collector! £70 including UK P&P

Hello!
It was lovely seeing so many of you at Alsager Civic on Saturday morning and watching the Hollow’s creatures find new homes.
I hope you all had a lovely Easter bank holiday.
After I spent some time nestled amongst the egg wrappers, watching as my grandson bounced along with wind up bunnies and wiping his small chocolatey fingers, I sat and pondered some new creations.
I would like to continue with a theme of flora and fauna through to summer but for quite sometime I have had other fantasy beings floating around in my head and on scraps of paper in the Hollow.
One of them is my Rockpool Sprite. I imagine them with curly hair dark or tanned skin or peppered with freckles. Tall and spindly but moving stealthily amongst the rocks and pebbles. I envisage her draped in seaweed and adorned with shells, her face painted with the markings of her kin. She’s a hunter, a warrior and a watcher of the tides.
I’ve been thumbing through folktales and looking where I could entwine my own spin with the names I found on the pages…mermaids, banshees, knockers and my head wanders…what if a beachcomber was a thing… or a bog trotter?!
So my cranial cogs are whirring, dancing around rockpools and pebbles, wading through muddy bogs and tiptoeing in caves and echoing through caverns.
Let’s see where they take me…
what are your ideas? X

Boxed Flower Nymphs
Hand sculpted and hand painted creatures inside stained wooden display boxes £40 each x