Tag: Kaj Stenvall

The Spirit and the Material of the Bottle, In Progress

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I’m back in Helsinki, but before I left Dortmund I started on another duck puzzle.

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I’m doing the more difficult ones first on purpose. Unfortunately, this has both large monochrome areas and just one type of pieces (basic shape with two tabs opposite). The puzzle was factory sealed (I’m not surprised), and there were quite a few pieces not properly separated. I usually don’t like that, but in this case, I’m not complaining…

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There was also quite a lot of puzzle dust.

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So much for the easy part: the top of the table cloth and the window in the upper right-hand corner.

At this point, I had to leave for the airport.

Firmly on the Ground, 2019-04-18

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A puzzle from the Kaj Stenvall Collection, with a cranky duck in a boat. This has only pieces of the basic shape with two tabs opposite, and it makes a big difference. There are a lot more candidates for each spot when you can’t rule any pieces out on basic shape. While the quality is pretty good, I had some cases where I had placed a piece wrong, and only noticed after I couldn’t get any further. It was possible to identify the wrongly placed pieces, but I had to look really closely.

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Firmly on the Ground by Kaj Stenvall, Tactic, 1000 pieces. Completed on April 18th, 2020.

The trees were the most difficult part.

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Here’s a close-up of the duck from the box. You can see the texture of the canvas, which is a great help while puzzling. You can’t see it in the really dark parts, though.

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Firmly on the Ground and the Kaj Stenvall Collection

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I wrote earlier about the puzzles by Tactic with images by Kaj Stenvall, and I decided to try to get all of them. They are all out of print, so I’m getting them second hand, although some are still factory sealed. I’ve been able to identify 30 puzzles, two with 500 pieces and the rest with 1000 pieces. There may be more, of course, as there is no complete list by Tactic, or by anyone else that I can find.

I currently have 19 of the 30, and four more are already on the way. They are good quality, although some of them have only pieces of the basic shape with two tabs opposite.

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I started on one, called Firmly on the Ground, and unfortunately, this is one of those. Some pieces were still stuck together from the previous assembly, and I’m taking advantage of that 🙂

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Good Morning or Good Night, 2019-02-27

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I’ve been buying quite a few of the Kaj Stenvall puzzles by Tactic, featuring Donald Duck lookalikes. Yes, that’s a black duck in the bed, although you can’t see it very well.

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Good Morning or Good Night by Kaj Stenvall, Tactic, 1000 pieces. Completed on February 27th, 2019.

I used to avoid these because of the large monochrome areas, but sometimes it’s nice to work on (moderately sized) areas where you have only the shape to go on, if the quality is good, of course. I only sorted the last 100 pieces according to shape, so this was actually pretty easy. And enjoyable.

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I did the orange bedspread first, then the darker pieces, then on to the white, and finally the last 100 pieces in between.