By Noel Widdifield LSOL.com Managing Editor

Author  Bio This is the second in a series of nine articles that will give you an in-depth look at some of the interesting vendors who were at the 22nd Annual National Garden Railway Convention in Santa Clara, California this year. This is a review of Mystic Mountain Arts, owned by Ray and Ellen Turner. They have been in this business for just over a year.

This is the second in a series of nine articles that will give you an in-depth look at some of the interesting vendors who were at the 22nd Annual National Garden Railway Convention in Santa Clara, California this year. We selected some of the smaller vendors who had interesting products to feature in this series.

Each vendor was selected because they had products that are very professionally done and are somewhat unique. There were many vendors at the show and almost all offered products that were worth spending your money to add to your collection. It was difficult to limit ourselves to only these nine, but we thought you would find what they had for sale to be something of special value or uniqueness.

This is a review of Mystic Mountain Arts, owned by Ray and Ellen Turner. They have been in this business for just over a year. He was looking for something to do after he had retired last year and decide to start this company. His interest is in railroading and model railroading and his wife's interest is in various kinds of art. She was already involved in a limited way in the hobby with her interest in creating artistic things.

This led them to create the Fairy Trains that they sell. The engines and cars are individually made and consist of teacups, old shoes, beehives, eggs, fairies and other whimsical objects. Ray explains that these trains tend to appeal to the women and children, especially girls, whose husbands, fathers, grandfathers or significant others are interested in Large Scale trains. These trains get the women and girls started in the hobby.

They also found that there are many people who create whimsical gardens that have nothing to do with Garden Railroading as many of us think of them. Their Fairy Trains appeal to those people in a way that traditional Large Scale trains do not. These gardeners use small buildings, fairies, dollhouse furniture, whimsical figures and miniature flowers to add interest to their gardens. Ray and Ellen saw a strong interest in this type of garden and thought it might provide a market for expansion in the Garden Railway community.

---

Ray doesn't know of any organizations or conventions that are specifically for fairy trains or fairy gardens. Many garden stores do sell sculpture or houses that have fairy themes. They have recently seen some gardens being built to the Hobbit theme. He believes that the Harry Potter movies have also created some interest in this type of garden. Ray and Ellen have focused their products to those ideas.

To create the products, Ellen molds the original figure in clay and then Ray tries to figure out how to engineer the product so that it can be produced. This plays to the artist in Ellen and the engineer in Ray. They then make a mold of the model or a piece of the model from silicon and use resin to cast the part or model. The model is then assembled and painted and decorated. The models are painted with acrylics because they are very long lasting and resistant to fading from the sun. This total process results in very original figures. Ray says that hardly any two are alike.

---

They offer three locomotives currently. These are the rabbit, swan and dragon. The motor blocks are from ARISTO CRAFT and USA Trains. These are very reliable and can easily be replaced should they ever fail. None has failed so far. The smoke unit in the dragon is the one used by LGB for their engines. It makes a lot of smoke and is protected against burnout when it runs dry.

---

A big seller for them are trains made as teacup sets. In these sets, there is a motor in the teapot and the cups are the cars.

---

---

Ray's favorite product is the dragon. It is relatively new and was only introduced a couple of months ago. He explains that it is a very popular product and thinks that is because of the recent Harry Potter movies. It makes a lot of smoke and really captures people's attention when they see it.

They get their ideas for products from a whole long list of ideas they have thought about. They are looking at creating something for Christmas time. They recently made a pumpkin car that was very popular at Halloween and Thanksgiving. They also have an Easter egg car that sold very well. The Easter egg car was offered both decorated and undecorated. They suggest that people might want to buy an egg car for each child in the family and let each child decorate it to their own individual taste. The family can then create a train with a rabbit pulling an egg for each of the children.

---

Before Ray started this business, he was a marketing director at a high-tech company. He is an engineer and has been most of his life. He and Ellen are the only employees of the company and they want to keep it that way. They would like to be a little bigger, but don't want the hassle of employees and all that entails.

They sell most of their products through shows. They have a website that has pictures of all of their products and the prices. The site also has tips on how to build a fairy garden and how to build a garden railroad, if people haven't done that before. They advertise in Big Train magazines and go to shows. They have gone to the National Garden Railway Conventions the last two years and these shows have been good for them.

---

They also have done a couple of garden shows that were of mixed success. Usually, people don't buy the products the first time they see them. They need to think about them and try to imagine them in their yard. The sales usually take place over time after the customer is first exposed to the products.

---

They have a large number of different cars and will continue to produce new versions as the ideas mature. The Mystic Mountain Arts locomotives and cars add a whole new dimension to Large Scale trains.

---

Their products run on very small radius curves and this allows a person to create a garden railroad in a large pot without the need for large areas to have a railroad. They manufacture track circles with a 20 inch diameter to fit in pots available from garden stores and are selling the track circles with brackets to fit a variety of pots. This gives a person the ability to go to a garden store, buy a large pot and put together a garden railroad in less than an hour.

---

Ray has a Large Scale railroad at his home. It consists of twelve hundred feet of track and runs on both battery and track power. His favorite part of Large Scale is building things. His railroad allows him to just run trains all day or he can do train operations.

Ray's final thought in the interview was that he feels that the Fairy Trains are a great way to get women and children interested in the hobby and the trains allow them to be involved in this hobby in a way that no other products provide. He made the observation that his booth at this show is right across the isle from the Ride On Trains booth. He says that as the men walk up to that booth and begin to spend a considerable amount of time looking at those trains, the women notice the Mystic Mountain Arts booth and come over a spend the same amount of time looking at the Fairy Trains.

Mystic Mountain Arts
10251 Kenny Lane
San Jose, California 95127
(408) 929-3097

Website: www.mysticmountainarts.com

Top of Page