The queen of everyday scenes

Ten years ago, Pauline Millard was in a devastating car accident. She broke her spine, and was nearly left paralysed. She’d suffered a serious head injury, lost three fingers, and was learning to walk again. Her consultant was clear. If she went home from hospital after six months of life-saving treatment and ‘curled up on the couch’, she’d never get better. ‘He said, “You have to make sure your brain is ticking over. What do you like doing?”’

Millard, now 60, had always liked the idea of miniaturemaking, though she’d never tried it. ‘I’d never made anything in miniature before... I started buying it and then I thought, I can make this for cheaper.’

The first thing she made was a wooden haberdashery counter, complete with balls of wool, spools of thread and knitting needles. She soon found the intricate, repetitive work was the perfect aid to her recovery.

A decade later, her shop Weaverthorpe Dolls House Miniatures, not far from York, is stacked to the rafters. Millard now has a collection of over 200,000 handmade miniatures. She works seven days a week, often until 1am to keep on top of demand. Using a guillotine for cutting metal, scalpels, wood, clay and paint, she spends a couple of hours a day making the popular household items people always want: tins of Heinz beans, wooden crates of carrots and onions, Oxo cubes and Kellogg’s cornflakes boxes, all of them mostly made from clay. A miniature tin of Campbell’s soup will set you back around £2.50.

She has loyal customers – like the woman who comes every year on her birthday and spends £900 – as well as new, younger ones. ‘It’s so busy; there’s only me,’ says Millard. ‘But I love my business.’