A tiny dollhouse

I’ve been building a new doll house for the Tiny Handmade dolls and posting about it on my Instagram account @tinyhandmadedolls. I find it easier to post on Instagram because blogging with my phone isn’t great. Does anyone have an app to recommend?

Anyway, it’s the Greenleaf Primrose kit with some changes. I made mine smaller, added an extra door on one side, and adjusted the windows. I made the door smaller too. I wanted it too look a bit like a cottage/tiny house or playhouse. I’ve added my own trims and details I’ll show more later. I’m considering adding a dormer window as the upstairs doesn’t have a window now. There’s lots more to do but the dolls have already moved in... 

Putting in the stairs

 

This was my favourite stage so far, the stairs! So exciting, they really add lots of nice detail to the house. This is me painting all the little pieces that will be white, the risers and the spindles. The handrail and treads are stained.

And here are the stairs in place:

The whole left wall of this house has lots of details, there is a built-in bookcase, two fireplaces and of course, the stairs. That's what makes the Glencroft special.

Here are some details of the stairs:

And the top half:

As you can see the joins around the tabs look pretty messy so I'm going to use filler and sand/prime/paint those areas again. The edge of the stairs will be covered by a wall though so I don't have to do the sides, just the interior walls.

I also spent forever fussing with the handrails. The ones in the kit were just square on the edges, obviously, but to fit nicely against the wall and each other I sanded them down to angled edges. But then they were too short.

So I made new ones using the strips between other pieces on the sheets. You can cut them with an exacto knife then sand them to the right length and angle on the edges.  I was pleased with the results, but there's nothing like taking a close-up photo to see all the flaws - I will have to prime over that glue!

Also at this stage I have to decide how the stairwell will be decorated as it won't be very accessible once that side wall goes up. I have a vintage ribbon that may make a nice carpet but I'm not sure if it's the style I want for the house.

Although so far the decorating style I've decided on is just anything I think is pretty. And, it occurs to me now, anything I'm not allowed to do in our real house!

Walls up!

At this stage I decided to fill in the big interior window in the left wall (that's the left wall piece on the green cutting mat in the picture above). The interior window is upstairs in the bedroom next to the stairwell. I saw this done on Susan Grimshaw's website, and agreed that it would be more useful to have a solid wall in that spot for furniture placement or a picture or mirror.

The easiest way to do this is to leave the pieces you're meant to punch out in place. In this hole there were pieces I needed for the bookcase, so I did punch those out then replaced them with leftover small pieces of plywood. I then filled in all the gaps with polyfilla. Then lots of sanding, priming then painting. And voila, no more window!

While it slows things down a bit to do these things as you go along I'm glad I did because it would be a lot harder to work on a vertical wall in the house later on. Also while working on this wall I was priming and painting other pieces I needed. This kind of thing is easy, just a bit time consuming.

But the next part, putting in the second floor, was a nightmare. So frustrating! The instructions tell you to angle the floor and side it in place but there are a lot of pieces that need to fit around it and it can be fiddly getting it in place with all the tabs fitting together.

I had a problem mainly because I had painted it first. So the pieces were sort of gripping each other and I had to try to wiggle/wedge it in place, then wiggle it back out and sand it down (and trim the sides of the tabs), then try again, many many many times.

The red spots are sticky notes labelling the pieces.

Then ironically after that there was a gap between the centre wall and the second floor. At this point I was extra annoyed with the kit. But in the end it was done and it was quite satisfying to be at this stage. You can really start to see the whole house, how big it is, how big the rooms are, and you have a sense of how things are arranged and put together.

I also decided that any discrepancy up to around 3/16" is fine. And the gaps will be covered with flooring or filler later on. After working with lots of pieces I realized that's just sometimes as close as I could get to everything fitting together neatly.

I thought I would take a break at this stage but that's not been the case. In my next post, the stairs!

Starting the kit

Starting a dollhouse kit can be pretty daunting. When I opened the Glencroft box it was just a stack of plywood pieces. It also comes with a large printed sheet of instructions, and another smaller booklet with general assembly tips.

So I gathered up my "tools" ie. exacto knife, pencil, ruler, primer, brushes, cutting board and plastic bags to cover the table. I was going to try not to think too far ahead, just punch out the first set of pieces needed for the first few steps and start with those. This kit has a million pieces!

I had decided to prime and paint each piece to keep them from warping by sealing them. I figured I'd do it before assembly as it would be easier to work on flat pieces. The man in the dollhouse store had recommended sealing the pieces with shellac, and the tips sheet said "shellac cut 50/50 with alcohol". But I didn't really know what that was exactly and didn't have any on hand so I decided to just use primer and paint. I want the walls to be white anyway.

first three pieces in place - there are books underneath to support the base

The main problem I had starting out is that the pieces didn't pop out very easily from the sheets. The first few were really frustrating and I had to cut over and over around the edges with the exacto knife. But the later ones have been better... the main thing is to press them out pretty gently so they don't break, and then they need to be sanded as they're a bit rough.

Also, if you prime and/or paint them it's best to keep the edges bare as the tabs won't fit together if there's anything on them to make them thicker. Sometimes the tabs aren't perfect anyway and you have to shave them down with an exacto knife. I learned to always dry fit before applying glue to make sure all the tabs line up and fit together!

Also, just like IKEA, if something seems wrong don't just forge ahead. The kit isn't wrong, one of the pieces could be backwards. So make sure everything's right before you glue. At this stage I was questioning my decision to do this and finding the kit pretty annoying...