Featured D56 Collector #2: Fort Frightful

Note: "Fort Frightful" is the codename given to this collector...

What got you started collecting villages?
I found a local Hallmark store that had a huge display. I thought they looked great, and started looking for my own.

How many years have you been collecting?
7 or 8 years

What is your favorite D56 series?
It is a tie between the original Snow Village, and the Halloween series

How many displays do you build per year?
2 – one for Halloween, and one for Christmas. I am a little slow taking down each series, so I display the houses for a good 4-6 months at a time. This past year, we didn’t get the Christmas display down until Mother’s Day! LOL

Do you keep a list of all your pieces that you own?
Yes

What's the latest piece you've bought?
Actually it was a lemax piece for Halloween called “Bridge of Bones”. The last Dept 56 piece was “building fort frightful”.

What was the first piece you bought?
It was either the Monopoly series, or the Snow Village Carousel – I can’t remember

How many people have you turned on to D56 collecting?
I don’t think any, but many people are fascinated with it, and I have discovered others who collect also.

Do you keep track of values of the pieces or not?
Yes

What else do you collect?
Pinball Machines – and overall a lot of junk as well as Hallmark Ornaments.

What's the most unique display you''ve ever built?
The Christmas display last year. It took up our entire 12x12 sunroom. It had 3 levels and had a train running through it.

Do you have any pictures of displays you'd like to share:

Comments

Tomorrow is Labor Day, Next Up is Halloween!

Hooked on Department 56 has a great article on tips for creating your halloween village . The article features tips and informative links on all of the wonderful and scary options for outfitting your decorative halloween villages, including haunted sounds, spooky lights, and flying witches. The story also features information about The 2008 Haunted Rails Engine & Coal Car, and Rickety Railroad Station, two of Department 56's Halloween village pieces created to mark the ten year anniversary of D56 Halloween. While the train itself is ceramic and non-working, you still get the feel of the haunted railroad. The also is not limited to just D56, as it also mentions Disney Villains from Hawthorne Village. An excerpt from the story: "In 1998, Department 56 introduced the first Halloween village collection. Department 56 Halloween Village features spooky castles, flying witches, skeletons, and gravediggers. Many of the buildings are lighted with fiber optic light effects, that fli...

Lego in the news this week

Olin administrator builds Lego Needham Town Hall It turns out that two Town Halls were built in Needham this year. One was the brick-and-mortar building sitting in Needham Center, which underwent renovations and additions and will be officially unveiled at a Needham300 event on Nov. 5. The other Town Hall is made of Legos. Nick Tatar, Assistant Dean of Student Life at Olin College, built this second Town Hall at Olin over the course of three months, starting in January. Working with Olin professor Brad Minch and seven children and Olin students, Tatar built the Town Hall out of fifteen thousand Lego pieces, sometimes working 10 to 15 hours a week on the project. On Nov. 5, Tatar will break the Town Hall into chunks and transport it to the other Town Hall. At noon, he will reassemble it, then step back and let people admire his handiwork. Tatar said that he decided to build this Lego Town Hall for kids to enjoy during the Nov. 5 Needham 300 gala. “I wanted to see if we c...

Celebrate the arrival of the February/March Village D-Lights!

Fresh in my mailbox was a brand new issue of Village D-Lights , a magazine designed for village collecting enthusiasts, featuring great articles, display tips product information and much more. This edition's cover features the "Canton Tea Trading", a new piece for 2008 for Dickens' Village. Here is what you'll find in this (February/March) issue: * The cover story describes some of the 2008 introductions for Christmas in the City, Alpine Village and Dickens' Village. * A great feature on Randy Miller, president of the NCC . * A spectacular ad by D56 for the "American Diner". * Ms. LitTown writes about the new Department 56 showroom, which is being prepped for the 2008 convention. * A letter from Mrs. Dickens * Brandon Taylor's take on variations of some of the pieces * A Valentine's Day feature on themed pieces for that special day There's also many regular sections of the magazine: reader submissions, letter from the editor, trivia, di...

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