Dragon Art: Magweno Art Dolls
Originally, I was going to post a dragon feature of a different nature, but then this little guy arrived at my door:
So instead I'm going to talk about the fabulous creations of Maddy Norval, owner and creator of Magweno Art Dolls.
Maddy is an incredibly talented artist whose work varies from independent commissions to creatures of her own imagining that she sells in her shop. She has several lines of dolls that can be customized to the buyer's specifications. Notable among these are dragon-inspired creatures, which I will talk about here.
Part dragon, part fox, all adorable. These fuzzy, floppy little guys live to brighten up your day and put a smile on your face.
Their head, hands and feet are all cast in resin, and the body and tail are machine sewn using high quality fake fur. Customization options include primary and secondary fur colors, eye color, scale color, bow color, and your choice between a dragon tail, fox tail, or no tail.
Plumpkins, or ambling loaf dragons, are lazy dragons who hate exercise and love Netflix binge-a-thons.
Plumpkins are Maddy's newest creations. She kicked off their line by holding a social media contest, which is how I first came across her work.
Plumpkins have resin cast head, horns, wings, and paws and machine stitched cuddlesoft bodies. The wire armatures in their bodies means you can pose them in any way you wish! Customization options include body color, tummy color, head color, wing color and markings, and horn color.
Why wear a flower on your wrist to prom when you could be wearing a dragon instead? What Ophies lack in size they make up for in spirit. Their fierce, protective nature make Ophies the perfect choice for guarding your most valuable possessions.
Ophies can be customized in a variety of ways. There are six different available head types, three different wing types, and of course body and head color can be customized as well.
Ordering from Magweno Art Dolls is super easy. You can place a custom order from her shop on Etsy, but if you have a quick question about one of her dolls or want a price quote you can always shoot her an email at [email protected].
Maddy offers a variety of payment plans on her dolls, including all up-front, half up-front and half upon completion, and a layaway plan on orders over $50.
After specific customization details and a payment plan has been decided upon, it takes Maddy approximately 10 days to finish one order. She then packages the doll, wrapping it in bubble wrap and tissue paper in one box and then placing that box in a larger box surrounded by packing peanuts so your doll is safe and snug for its travels. She also includes a handwritten note, a tag with your doll’s specific info, and one of her business cards. In my package, she also placed a heart sucker, which was super sweet. Shipping can take anywhere from 5 to 21 days. In my case it only took 5 days, which I found astounding considering I live in Northern California and she lives in Northern Scotland.
I first came across Maddy’s work when a friend of mine posted info on Magweno’s Plumpkin contest on her Facebook page. Needless to say I was absolutely enchanted with the portly dragons, and spent the better part of a day combing through Magweno’s Etsy, Facebook, and Tumblr pages. I fell in love with her work and was delighted to see that she was currently accepting custom orders.
It was a hard decision for me to choose just one of her dolls to order, because the quality of her work was just so dang good and each doll beautiful in its own way. I eventually decided on the Dragon Fox, because, well, dragons, and that foxy face was just too precious.
I was a bit apprehensive though because I had never commissioned an artist I didn’t know personally. All of Magweno’s pages were really warm and friendly, however, and even invited questions via email, so I decided to forge ahead and contact her.
Her response was prompt, and she was both friendly and professional in answering all my questions. I had also asked her if it would be possible to attach dragon wings to a Dragon Fox (just to make it a bit more dragonny). She was totally open to the additional customization and even provided pictures with one of her existing Dragon Foxes as well as different options for the wings and what the additional charge would be.
The entire process was very smooth. Her responses to my emails were within a day, which was to be expected considering the time difference and the fact that her business hours were long over by the time I decided to drag myself out of bed in the morning. She did not begin work on my Dragon Fox until all the details about customization were sorted out, but again that went rather quickly because I knew exactly how I wanted my Dragon Fox to turn out.
The actual process of making my Dragon Fox took the 10 days that Magweno promised on her websites, which I was actually quite impressed with because that Plumpkin contest had really boosted her popularity and I knew from her Tumblr that she was also working on several other orders at the same time as my Dragon Fox was coming together. She sent me a picture of my Dragon Fox’s head, just to make sure the colors all looked good to me, and then finished him up and sent me pictures of the completed product to make sure I was completely happy. I was, of course, thrilled, and sent in my final payment.
I am now a proud owner of one of Magweno’s Dragon Foxes, who I have named Lance. I still need to find a place of honor for him amongst all my other dragons, but in the meantime he’s happy to sit on my shoulder and watch me work.
Magweno Art Dolls - Links!
Customs Price List and Ordering Info
**Note: Magweno Art Dolls has closed custom orders until April 1st because that Plumpkin contest really boosted her popularity!**
