She carries her main and forward main sails, as well as two jibbs and will be depicted inside the bottle sailing under a good breeze on the Chesapeake Bay.

Her hull is carved from bass wood and painted with enamel paints.  I think I was able to depict her unique shaped bow as well as her slick stern and transom.  The deck seams are indicated by pen marks from a .2 mm rotring drafting pen.

The wheel is a watch gear with the outside edge cut off.  Skylight windows were taped and painted (I have found some amazing and fine tape tape which allows me to do the most minute work).  Turnbuckles are pin heads and various watch parts are used to represent blocks throughout the rig and on deck.  Her masts are long leaf yellow pine and spreaders are painted wire. 

This miniature ship has turned out  beautifully and represents reality quite well in comparison to its size.  Her hull is only three inches long (about the length of my index finger)

She is complete with as much deck detail as possible including her cabins, hatches, skylights, steering wheel, bulwarks, slender masts, sheets, various lines coiled on deck, and full rigging.

Her hull is painted dark blue and she recieved a gold cove stripe as well as pretty turquoise bottom paint.

The Wolf Trap Lighthouse is carved out of bass wood as well.  She will sit about 1 1/2 inches out of the water once inserted into the bottle and proved overall, to be a difficult build. 

The lighthouse itself is constructed on top of a round tube which in reality is permantly atttached to the Bay floor and filled with concrete. 

My lighthouse was constructed in two pieces.  The tube and deck is carved from bass wood and flares to meet the deck (balcony). The railing is made of tiny wire pieces with a top rail of thread, glued in place, which proved extremely difficult.

The house was then carved from basswood and has the shape of an octagon, with a slight peak of the roof.  Wooden trim was glued to the edge to accentuate the overhang of the roof, and windows were cut and glued up from paper.

 

Finally the tower is a square piece of wood with a wire balcony rail.  The light itself is a shard of yellow glass incased in a plastic tube painted black at the base.  The roof is a octagonal shaped piece of wood painted to suit.

It's time to take on the most stressful task of cutting the boat from the block of wood it was carved on.  Typically, she's literally launched from the block after I've just cut through the very last thread of wood.  If I'm lucky, I manage to get a good enough grip on her hull or masts, otherwise some damage is inevitable. 
This time, all went well, and with a big sigh of relief, I lifted my boat just as the saw blade parted it.

She is certainly a pretty sight and will prove to be a beautiful scene in bottle.  Now I've just got to get it passed the bottle's neck!

 

Left: Check out her hand painted flame and upper rigging details.  Miniature blocks are tiny watch pieces (washers) workable only with the sharpest tweezers.

The container of choice is a one liter laboratory, pyrex bottle.  These are often the best bottles to use because they are incredibly clear.  The sea is a universal window/plumbing "mastic" that I find here in Switzerland.  The surface dries stiff but the interior remains soft.
The waves are shaped and whitecaps are suggested by painting the wave crests.

 Masts are carefully folded, paying great attention to the sails, so as not to crease them.  (My hand gives an even better scale to the actual size of the model).

Photo left, shows how the sail had to be folded on top of the deck because of the lazy jacks.  This makes it incredibly bulky, and hard to insert.  Spreaders also need lots of attention and breaking one would be difficult to fix inside the bottle.
This of the type of ship whom, once in, isn't coming out! 

Ultimately, I got her in no problems, positioned, glued in place, with sails raised.  The lighthouse will be in the back corner.