Breyer Adamek

Today's my birthday, so I bought myself a model horse! Well strictly speaking, I pre-ordered him from one of my favourite sellers, then when the stock arrived in the UK about a week ago he was sent to me, but knowing my birthday was so soon, I put the box away so I'd have something to open on the right day.

This is one of 2022's regular runs, the one I was most excited to see and own - Adamek the Akhal-Teke stallion.

He is absolutely stunning! 

I loved this sculpt right from when it was first revealed, it really nails the conformation and character of the breed, and although I was sad the two best Akhal-Teke colours got used up on unattainably rare and expensive exclusives (a sooty buckskin to the Premier Club, then metallic cremello for a limited Breyerfest SR), I do think this colour looks good on him.

There's just enough metallic sheen to the paintjob to capture the famous golden coat, without it looking at all overdone or decorator-ish, and there's so much shading it doesn't look flat or boring despite being yet another solid bay for my collection. There's no way this horse will ever blend in and be boring, look at him!

His markings are great too; I know they're based on a real horse rather than an aesthetic choice by the Breyer designers, but the four white socks really lift the colouring, and the big star and snip on his face are lovely - an off-centre pink nose always gives a horse an appealingly quirky face.

And if you look closely, you'll see something remarkable : the face markings are mapped, that halo of dark skin showing clear through the fine peach-fuzz on a horse's muzzle, and even on the forehead on this ancient desert breeds with such a sleek short coat. Breyer have dappled in mapping before, so we know they can do it, but it's always been saved as an added level of detail for exclusive releases, the limited editions and club models, small runs and one-of-a-kinds - never on anything 'basic' for the regular run range. I love it!

His expression is so sharp and alert, and of course this dynamic pose gives him a huge amount of movement and life. One of my favourite horsey books is 'Golden Horse' by photographer Artur Baboev (chances are if you've ever looked up photos of the Akhal-Teke online, you've seen some of his work), and this sculpt really reminds me of those pictures : a horse free and playing, enjoying his own speed and strength.

I like to give my models a name from the right language and naming traditions, and one of the easiest ways to do this is to borrow them from real horse pedigrees. So I looked up Adamek, and scrolled back through the generations, til I found a name which appealed - hmm, Melekush, that's nice? But it's always worth a quick run through Google, just to make sure a name doesn't translate to something which wouldn't be fitting (like a meaning of 'dark' for a palomino, or 'white legs' for one with not a speck of white on it, hah), and in this case it was fine - apparently it means 'angel', which isn't colour-dependent at all.

And as well as an authentic name, I do enjoy making little pieces of tack which suit a breed, especially if there's a long-standing tradition of them wearing something very distinctive or decorative. Akhal-Tekes are frequently photographed wearing collars, from simple braided cord or studded leather, all the way through to elaborate jewelled and beaded pieces with fantastical levels of detail and creativity.

There's a huge amount of variety, in materials and styles, so it's a chance to be creative and play with what I can create from things I've already got in my modelmaking craft boxes, left over from other projects. I spent the last couple of days constructing a couple of collars, using a random other horse to stand in because he wasn't out of his box yet.

The narrow collar is braided thread, beaded gold along one edge, with a hanging blue 'evil eye' charm or nazar. I don't know how commonly these are hung from the horses' necks like this, but I saw a few photos (like this one here) and loved the idea so much I had to make one. It's done with glue and paint, layered on a little circle of clear plastic cut from the front of another Breyer's box.

The wider collar is two layers of coloured paper, drawn on with pens, with tiny glass beads I glued on afterwards. Only they kept falling off, so I had to then paint the entire thing over with another layer of glue to hold them firmly in place, and that has the unexpected bonus of making the paper look slightly shiny, like leather.

Neither collar goes all the way around the neck! Because his mane is in the way, they'd emphasise how obviously artificial that solid plastic hair is, by holding them in an unnatural shape away from the neck. So instead I snipped through both the braid one and the paper one, to give the impression they continue under the overlapping locks of hair, and attached them to the model with tiny little pieces of rolled up micropore medical tape! The glue on that is very weak and easy-peel, far safer for the paint finish than stronger tape, and while I wouldn't try leaving it in place long-term, it wasn't risking damage to use it for one short photoshoot.

I think he looks better 'dressed up' in his collars, they're a spectacular addition to the real horses so it's satisfying to recreate something similar for my mini one. But some photo showing judges insist on no tack at all, so I needed pictures both with and without if I want him to be able to enter all possible show classes in future.

A gorgeous birthday present, even if I did buy him for myself!