A Little Song of Summer: Ulyana 2.0

Hi, everyone!

Not long ago I had a kit with an unusual story, and I’d like to tell you a little about it.

First, some backstory. On April 27 last year, a gentleman appeared in my DMs asking me to sell him my Ulyana. The request surprised me for two reasons: who would want my wonky little handiwork, and, what’s more, this person was from Italy! Who in Italy needs a Soviet pioneer girl? I confess, my first thought was that this must be some new kind of scam, an African prince, or plain trolling. But no. The gentleman was serious. Selling my garage kits wasn’t part of my plans, though. They may not be very good, but every last one is dear to me. So we agreed that I’d make him a new one, exclusively and for free (because I don’t dare charge money for my handiwork ).

And so. Renge was called into service again. I don’t like her build—Ulyana isn’t a first-grader, after all—but I still haven’t come up with anything better.

I sculpted the hair from La Doll; I hadn’t discovered Mr. Hard Clay yet. La Doll is ultra-fragile. If your hands grow from the right place, you can probably learn to manage it somehow, but later on I simply found a better alternative.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that I tried literally every kind of putty I owned on this kit, including the one that’s apparently meant for robots (if I understand correctly, that would be Mr. Dissolved Putty), and yes, gray primer too :’) I had an awful time removing it afterward. A girl ought to look alive, not like a zombie, and not as if she’s buried under a thick coat of white plaster over gray.

I also tried Gaia’s flesh-colored primer here. It isn’t exactly an essential product, but why not.

The skirt.

I did the hair using the technique from Dina’s axe-wielding redhead.

And I went to town on the T-shirt with Gaia Premium Red, so it gleamed like the bodywork on a new car

This time there are no photos at all of me painting the eyes, sadly(

And it seemed like everything should have been ready for assembly at this point, but… it turned out that the hair strand wouldn’t fit properly under the raised arm. No idea how that happened, but I had to break it off and attach it all over again

Back then I didn’t yet know about the wonderful fellow who makes those god-tier round bases (like Shinobu’s), so I asked my husband to plane me a square from an ordinary board. Magnets were set into the board and the sneakers so Ulyana could be neatly taken off and put back on.

The girl is cast-off, so here’s a curtsy for the connoisseurs:

Another mishap struck at almost the final step: I pressed too hard and the collar, patched with a thousand different putties, cracked. I had to repair it on the fly. A rather unpleasant job.

I made the ice cream from two-part Tamiya epoxy (the cone) and Mr. SSP (the setting agent is pink by default), so there was almost nothing left to paint.

The base was rather plain at first, but then I bought some grass from AmiAmi and a static-grass applicator from AliExpress, and managed to wait for them to arrive and put them to use. (Yes, she took me a veeery long time—the photos span last summer, winter, and this summer in the finals, heh.)

The final version of the base.

And now, at last, the final photos. A simple but sweet summer girl.

And with the first version of Ulyana:

And so, once we’d taken the photos, it was time to say goodbye.

The postal service worked surprisingly quickly: she made it to sunny Sicily in just eleven days and delighted her rightful owner, which in turn made me very happy :3

I don’t think this is the end of my Ulyana story. There will definitely be a 3.0 version for my Everlasting Summer shelf—which will also definitely happen, because the base figures have already been found and are waiting

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!