Finished Julip Stableblock!

 As promised, this post will be pretty word-light and picture heavy!

The Bridle Tree Barn-Raising Challenge 2021!

This project has been a long time coming, and just to warn you, this is one of my biggest blog posts to date, so I'd advise getting yourself a cup of tea and a snack if you're intending on reading the whole thing in one go! (seriously, it's like 10k of tutorial and angst)

A 'spot' of customisation!

 

Obligatory 'sorry for not posting, I'm useless' introduction, now onto the main topic!

As you may have noticed, I haven't posted any Julip content in a good long while. I don't hate them, nor am I giving up collecting them, they just aren't my main focus these days. With one thing or another I haven't bought a new Julip in years, my last one being a very generous gift I was given last year right before lockdown. I've got several ideas for orders, but who knows when they'll happen!

Anyway, long story short, a few months ago my friend Paul asked me if I'd like to rehome his solitary Julip. He'd been gifted him a number of years ago and while he liked Julips, this particular one didn't really do anything for him as the appaloosa pattern was a bit unrealistic, and he knew I'd be able to give him a more appreciative home. He suggested I customise him and after seeing photos, I definitely agreed. 

With one thing or another, he finally made his way across the pond a couple of weeks ago, and upon opening the box I was greeted to this terrifying sight!

Lake District Julip Live 2019

While my dolls have definitely taken over as my main hobby, I still absolutely love going to Julip shows as they're always great fun and its one of the few times a year I get to hang out with groups of likeminded rubber pony people.

This year, Magda was off at a very inconveniently timed family wedding, so it was just Heather and I making the journey south to the Lake District. We'd booked the same guesthouse we stayed at last year in the seaside town of Morecambe, as it was really nice and very convenient in all respects. For a change we made it down without issue, not getting lost once, and managed to book in early so we had time to wander about Morecambe. Unfortunately our room was right at the very top so lugging multiple boxes of ponies upstairs wasn't exactly fun!

It was a glorious day, cool yet sunny - a far cry from the boiling hot experience of last year!

Julip Live 2018!

 -Photos without my waffling here-

As mentioned in the previous post, I travelled down to Tetbury last week to stay with my friends Tomas and Rory and the three of us drove to Oxford for the show. We had intended to arrive super early so we could nab all the good spares and get set up, but alas, the best laid plans and all that. We did get to drive through some seriously spooky mist though...

Lake District Julip Live 2018!

As will have been pretty obvious for anyone who's read my blog for a long time, I haven't posted much Julip stuff in a while.

This isn't entirely by choice, but rather that my muse has wandered and affixed itself to my 1/6th scale dolls rather strongly. I still love my little rubber ponies to death, I'm just not really in the mood to do anything with them other than admire them on my shelf right now. On one hand this is incredibly depressing as they've been such a huge part of my creative life for so long, not making tack and stable stuff feels really weird, but on the other, I've still got lots of plans for the future which I fully intend to carry out at some point, so it's not like I've lost interest completely or anything. I still definitely want to make a new stable set as the old wooden ones took up waaaaay too much space and I'd like something a little more custom. I'd also really like to get back into my photostories as I really miss them and I had loads of drama that never actually made it into story form...

Anyway, I digress; you didn't come here to read about my chronic procrastination, did you?

(I mean if you did you're certainly in the right place but that's besides the point...)

Regardless of whether or not I'm in 'the Julip zone', I'm never going to miss out on going to shows and the annual Lake District Live hosted by Stacey and her mum is honestly one of my favourite shows to go to. As with all Julip shows, by it's very nature it's chilled out and great fun, with a really friendly atmosphere. I've been going with my friends Heather and Magda for the last couple of years which has only added to the great holiday roadtrip feel of the whole thing. We usually find a B&B to stay in near the show hall, but this time ended up in lovely Morecambe at the Trevelyan Guesthouse.

Some VERY belated new ponies!

I've been a very bad Julip owner and haven't posted about this lot at all!

I got two spares at the official Julip Live last October (which I still haven't posted about! D:) as well as a couple of animals, and snagged yet another spare just before Christmas.

When I arrived at the live show, as ever, there was a huddle around the spares table so I dumped my bag and boxes by my table and raced over, and to my delight there were still plenty left. The first to catch my eye was this striking lad - a Sports Horse with dropped head and added feathering. I'm not normally a huge fan of the mould as it can be a bit awkward looking but the dropped head really makes a huge difference and I love him now. I named him Taliesin, not originally after the eponymous ancient Welsh poet who I hadn't heard of until recently, but Taliesin Jaffe, the voice actor who I first came to know of through watching Critical Role. I just thought it was a really unusual name!

I love his detailed mapping...

...and his really quirky interrupted blaze.

 I didn't intend to buy more than one spare but as so often happens at live shows, they call out to you and you find yourself powerless to resist their rubbery charms. This was indeed the case with Womble the donkey, who took so long to name it's literally been months since I got him, and is the main reason why it's taken me so long to post about them all!

I was very brave when I got home and very carefully cut a mane slot in his neck so I could hair him properly. As much as I love the donkey mould, I really don't like its baldness, so I added mohair to his neck as well as his tail. In hindsight I wish I'd given him more blonde than grey but never mind. His ears looked a little plain too so he got the painted ear floof treatment.

He's only my second donkey and it's really interesting to compare him to Lyra, who was made fairly early on in the mould's life.

I have to pose Lyra like this as her forelegs are different sizes and she doesn't stand stable any other way, so ignore that aspect. Womble looks somewhat bigger too, though that could just be an optical illusion because of their different stances.

Lyra is a lot rougher in texture everywhere, whereas Womble is considerably smoother, and the odd-sized legs are more even now. While I prefer the newer, sleeker donkey overall, I do prefer the more defined features of the older model. I'm not sure if its just down to mould wear or over-buffing, but that's the great thing about Julips, they're always different, even if they've come out of the mould one after the other!

I couldn't resist some more animals either, and the colour of this lovely cat immediately reminded me of Tristan, my friend's old cat who died last year. He was a big fluffy Birman so the model isn't a perfect portrait of him but the colour is spot on. He was affectionately known as Tristie (or whingy, as he meowed loudly all the time if you ignored him for more than a couple of minutes) so that's what I named his mini version.

Here he is making friends with siblings Alfie and Edie.

 I might repaint his eyes to match the real mog at one point as I hadn't noticed they weren't blue until now!

The bunnies I named Sandy and Frost, and they join the rest of the warren which is growing so quickly I've had to cobble together this handy name chart so I can remember which is which!

Just before Christmas, Laura announced that she'd be doing some spares, and everyone put forward some suggestions for colour and mould combinations they'd like. I've been after a fleabitten grey welshie for AGES, so when I got a message asking if I'd like first refusal on such a pony, I leapt on the opportunity!

I've always wanted a little grey pony I could inflict lots of pink and diamanté encrusted tack upon, as I think every riding school has that one pony that looks like the result of a unicorn exploding around them; all glitter and bling! I'm not a huge fan of pink myself, but the idea of making all the aforementioned bling really appeals to me so I'm really looking forward to it!

I called her Angel to fit with the 'perfect pony' theme and well, it was Christmas, so it seemed appropriate! XD 

She's the only one to have her own item of tack made so far!

Official Julip Live 2015!

As you all know, I find it difficult to get to Live Shows as they're invariably held at the other end of the country which, as I don't drive, is insanely expensive to reach on the train, so I either have to cadge a lift off another kind collector (or my dad!) or don't go at all, simple as that.

I was determined to make it to this particular show however, as it was a little bit special, celebrating Julip's 70th Anniversary!

Lake District Live 2015!

I don't often get to go to live shows as I live so far from the regularly held ones in the UK - everything's always on waaaay Down South and it's very expensive for me to travel there and back as I don't drive. Last year I had great fun at the Lake District Live held by fellow Julip collector Stacey, and when I heard she was going to hold it again this time round I leapt at the chance to go.
Luckily for me, Julip newbie and stablemate expert extraordinaire Heather lives even further north than I do, and very kindly offered to give me a lift down with her. Despite having never actually met before, we soon discovered that we had a lot in common and there was barely a quiet moment the entire car ride!

Exciting news from Julip!

Cross posted from MHL, GJF and the 'Just Julips' FB group. Julip has a new owner!

Post by libby on Oct 1, 2013 at 5:26pm

A couple of months ago I was given the opportunity to purchase Julip as a company with the exception of the Horse of the Year range; as a result, Julip has now been divided into two entirely separate companies, those being the Julip Horse of the Year range and Julip Originals.

The Julip Horse of the Year range (which will still be owned by Annabel) will continue to run in much of the same way it always has and horse of the year products will still be available for purchase directly via www.juliphorses.com/
and through a variety of online suppliers.

However Annabel will no longer be producing the original latex Julip’s, these products will now be produced by us (me!) under the new name of Julip Originals.
The aim of Julip Originals is to produce everything you have come to expect from the Julip brand in exactly the way it has always been, from the moulds to the latex, from the paints to the thinners, everything is identical to what has been used in the past.

While we are aiming to produce all of the latex products Julip Horses has released, which includes horses, ponies, yearlings, foals, cats, dogs, foxes and even doves, initially we will only be able to make batches of spares and not custom orders; of course special orders will be able to be taken once production is in full swing and we are also hoping to introduce some new exciting moulds in the coming year. Its also safe to say that the Julip shows and 'paint your owns' will also continue to be a part of Julip.

Over the next couple of months we will be launching an official Julip Originals website, community forum, Facebook group, Twitter feed and Flicker account.

In the meantime if you have any questions or queries please do not hesitate to ask and we will strive to keep the Julip community up to date with any progress.

As we have only just taken possession of all the moulds and other paraphernalia it is going to take a little while to get up and running, so please bear with us and i'll do my best to keep everyone informed of our progress

This should mean that orders will be far easier to make and will get a lot faster and more efficient as they were kinda lacking in that department the last few years.