I have loved Department 56 buildings for quite some time, though I only started collecting recently. My first quandary was which type of village I wanted to collect, and it has taken me a couple of years to make up my mind. The second quandary was how to display the buildings. I also wanted to keep almost all my displays up all year long. I began with the New England Village and it remains my main focus. Probably because I love New England so much! It was during a visit with my cousin, Bev, in Maine during the summer of 2000 that I decided on New England Village. We ended up going to a neat shop in Belfast that had all the different villages displayed, and I was finally able to decide which look I liked best.

I have since branched out to Christmas in the City, Storybook Village (for my granddaughter), and a few North Pole pieces for Christmastime. Those pieces will be displayed very differently than the New England Village, and they have their own unique, inherent display problems. The following photos and instructions will show and describe how I landscaped the displays and made room for the cords and transformers on shelves that are 36" long, 11 3/4" deep, and 12" high.

Whenever I can make something by hand, rather than buying it, I do. I get great enjoyment out of making the displays. I also try to keep the Department 56 people figurines to a minimum. They are really attractive, but I do not like the gross disproportion between the figures and the houses. As my husband says, they all look like Paul Bunyans compared to the houses. HO scale people are more in keeping with the scale of the houses, but they don't show well, particularly in a bookshelf display that has a lot of shadow. Most of the people you see in my displays are Lemax, which tend to be a little smaller, though they too are out of scale.

You will notice that I have painted the bases of many of my people and accessories to match the terrain, because no one will ever convince me that a collectible is a good monetary investment. Quite the contrary! The people in my village are all intelligent and have the good sense to not stand in every patch of snow they find, and that necessitated some paint and glue jobs.

On a final note, I would like to thank all the other Village Collectors who are part of the Department 56 email list who have answered my incessant questions about how to do things I couldn't figure out myself. In particular, I'd like to thank Judi Weers, who graciously helped me to understand her water techniques, and my Cousin, Bev, who has given me some great tips on items to use for what I wanted to accomplish. This past fall she collected New England fall leaves for me, soaked them in glycerin, and then punched them out with a mini punch, so I could scatter them throughout my village fall scenes. Now that's love and family all wrapped up in one person! :^)

If you don't understand how I did something, email me at [email protected] and I'll do my best to help you out. Hopefully, the instruction photos and brief commentary will answer most of your questions. Conversely, I'm always looking for tips and tricks myself, so if you have something you'd like to share with others, let me know and I'll post it here in the tips section.