Publications
Dawn Booth is taking us on a virtual tour of her home to meet her tiny house guests: Wally and Molly, a pair of four-centimetre-tall mice.
The rodent couple, standing on their hind legs, appear ready to embrace in front of their rather impressive house and garden at Dawn’s home in Forest Hill, Durban.
Wally and Molly are Dawn’s creations, fashioned from porcelain paste and occupying an impressively detailed miniature world she’s built.
READ MORE | This Pretoria artist is bringing new life to old bones
Dawn’s passion and enthusiasm for the world she’s created is clear – as is her goal of using the cheery mouse pair to teach children to live a more environmentally friendly life.
“I’m a total greenie. It’s not just saying no to plastic bags, it is a lifestyle,” Dawn says.
She published five books, three centered around Wally and Molly, aimed at young readers between five and nine. She wrote the first Wally and Molly story based around a sugar craft exhibition of a log inhabited by a family of 24 mice made by her friend Di Edgcumbe.
Dawn began sharing Wally and Molly content on her Facebook page and the next thing she knew, people stopped talking to her and started talking to Wally and Molly instead. “I thought let's put this into book form and the Wally and Molly stories were born,” the mom of two says.
Dawn had just started taking her books and elaborate dioramas to schools when lockdown came and says she plans to go back when she gets the go-ahead. Her books, she says, “are not just environmental books”.
“It’s a family story about these cute whimsical mice. The reason I have done these dioramas is because children love detail and they always want to know more. So you are bringing in the environmental message in a very non-threatening way.”
The dioramas she’s constructed include a mouse house, a veggie garden and an office for Wally and Molly.
She explains she uses the dioramas to show children how vegetables can be planted in a garden or how gardening can attract wildlife. “I think there’s so much environmental terror out there and I want, through these books and the dioramas, to make it (environmental learning) fun.”
Dawn’s work area is filled with miniature creations: little pieces of unfinished vegetables, gardening tools and paint tubes. She’s busy with a waterwheel for the mouse house, which she says will take at least a year to complete, and will be used in talks about becoming self-sustaining and getting off the grid.
Her eye for detail and patience has made it possible for her to furnish Wally and Molly’s house with tiny books, suitcases, cups and saucers as well as paintings.
READ MORE | Bruised to perfection: this woman creates beautiful art pieces on banana skin
She uses eggboxes, lolly sticks, recycled wood and old wet wipes to make the intricate items for the mouse house.
“The little candle is made from a bead and a washer; the paint tubes are made with tinfoil and the suitcases are made from little blocks of wood. It’s incredible detailing and it’s not about perfection, because the emphasis is on recycling.”
Dawn has partnered with the Durban conservation organisation, Kloof Conservancy to run the LEAF program, which is aimed at inspiring children to respect the environment.
Dawn’s dioramas will be on display at the Indigenous Open Gardens event this weekend through her project’s association with Kloof Conservancy.
She’s proud of her work and its message. “I have written books that I’m proud of and my goal is instilling a love of the environment in children,” she says. “And to make people happy for a while.”
