Lobster Shack

Miniature #1 – Constructed 07/2023

Fun Facts

Lobsters are a family of marine crustaceans. They live in crevices or burrows on the sea floor. In the early 1600’s, lobsters were so abundant along the New England shores that they would wash up on the beaches, sometimes 2 feet high.

Lobster anatomy has changed little over the last 100 million years. Its brain is located in its throat, its nervous system in its abdomen, teeth in its stomach and kidneys in its head. It also hears using its legs and tastes with its feet.

One of the few things lobsters have in common with humans is that they tend to favor one front limb, meaning they can be right-clawed or left-clawed.

Today, lobsters are expensive due, in part, to the length of their life cycle and over harvesting. These highly prized crustaceans are economically important and are often one of the most profitable commodities on Cape Cod and along the entire Eastern seaboard.

Description

As mentioned on the Home Page, this was my first attempt at using popsicle sticks to make a legendary, weathered shack where lobsters are often sold on Cape Cod. The success of this piece fueled me to continue building.

The shack sits on 12″x12″ plywood base. The overall piece stands 10″ high and the time invested to design and build was approximately 70 hrs.

Materials Used

The lobster shack was constructed with a frame made of square balsa wood dowels (photo below). Popsicle sticks were attached to the frame and painted with watercolor paint to make the popsicle sticks look weathered from the salt air. The trim was made from square balsa wood dowels and painted with cranberry acrylic paint.

The buoys on the front of the shack were carved from square balsa wood dowels and painted with various colors of acrylic paint, representative of the actual buoys fisherman attach to lobster traps on the ocean floor to enable locating them. The roof shingles were made from black cardstock paper, sprayed with textured spray paint, and cut by hand to resemble realistic roof shingles.

The crates were made from blocks of wood and a wood burner to create the lines and nail holes necessary to make them look like actual crates. They were then painted with different colors of watercolor paint to add interest and variety.

The rocks were made from Styrofoam and painted with acrylic paint. The lobsters on the Live Lobsters sign were made from buttons with the shanks removed and painted red with acrylic paint.

The pallets and firewood rack at the rear of the shack were made from square balsa wood dowels and painted with watercolor paint to make them look aged and weathered. The firewood in the rack was made from branches I collected in my yard.