I decided to “save myself some work” by using Houseworks staircases in the Victorianna, instead of building the kit stairs. I don’t know if it really saved me any work, but the first floor stairs are finally finished and they look good! I started by gluing strip wood to the side of the staircase, to […]
Category: Dollhouses (Page 15 of 28)
I’m almost done with the Victorianna stairs (the first floor, anyway) but here’s a quick post in the meantime. Besides finishing the stairs, another task that needs to get done on the Victorianna before I can move forward with assembly is laying down the hardwood floors in areas that will be inaccessible once the back […]
If I’m moving at a snail’s pace with the back-to-back Victorianna, it’s only because this house requires so much thinking! Once it’s put together, some spaces (like the staircase) are inaccessible, so I have to do everything I want to do there before I put the back on. But, some spaces (like the hallways that […]
Before I can start assembling the back-to-back Victorianna, I had to figure out where I wanted to cut holes for additional windows, hallways, etc. I scrutinized the dry fit from every angle and drew in the holes I wanted. The first one I tackled is the first floor passthrough from one side of the house […]
I’ve been messing around with my Victorianna dry fit to figure out where holes need to be cut before I start gluing anything. While doing this I discovered that the Victorianna is twice as deep as its 1:12 cousin, the McKinley. (Actually, it’s roughly the same depth, but since the Victorianna is half scale, the […]
Eons ago, I saw this picture in a Nutshell News from the 80s or 90s, of two McKinley dollhouses built back to back.* It always stuck with me as a really cool bash and I wanted to try it, but with the Victorianna — the half scale version of the McKinley, which has been out […]
Sometime between when I bought the gatorboard house and now, tiny houses have become a thing. After seeing some episodes of Tiny House Nation and Tiny House Hunters I decided that the Spanish Revival artist’s cottage qualifies as a tiny house. With the addition I’m planning to add it’s something like 460 square feet, so […]
After my first post about the breadbox roombox I kinda stopped talking about the broken lid. Surely all of my readers are dying to know what happened to it, so here you go! When we last saw the roombox lid, it was sitting snugly in a gluing jig. The corners weren’t quite right and Geoff […]
Two days until Christmas! Gotta get this roombox finished, or it’ll be embarrassing. :o With the wallpaper and cabinets finished, I glued in the baseboards and crown molding. This hanging basket is another Hallmark ornament. I had one of these already but had removed the bottom basket to make it more in scale. Since the […]
Less than a week until Christmas — time to finish those kitchen cabinets! I made a countertop from two pieces of basswood. I used a utility knife to cut a rough hole for the sink. Then I enlarged this carefully until it was just larger than the sink. A tad too large, actually, but once […]
The ink cartridge I was waiting for finally came in the mail, so I was able to move forward on the breadbox interior. The first step was staining the floor. This is a Houseworks flooring sheets that I got in a Freecycle haul this summer. I stained it with Minwax English Oak. When the stain […]
The Hallmark stove ornament I’m using in my Christmas breadbox roombox comes with a cord sticking out the back that you’re supposed to plug into a string of Christmas tree lights. I cut mine off long ago, but the very ends of the wires were still peeking out. When I started the breadbox project, I […]
Momentum on the Christmas breadbox hasn’t been quite as swift as I’d hoped… first I was waiting for a Miniatures.com order to arrive, and now am waiting for a new ink cartridge for the color printer. (Way cheaper to buy it online than locally, but no instant gratification!) At least I managed to make a […]
Because the Hallmark ornaments I’m using in my breadbox roombox have funky dimensions, I’m scratch building cabinets to go with them. This was my first time trying this, but how hard could it be? I started with the cabinet next to the fridge; we’ll go around the corner with a cabinet next to the stove […]
For years, I’ve been holding on to these Hallmark ornaments without anywhere to put them. They’re about 1:12 scale but look way too small when you put them with 1:12 cabinets (especially the fridge). And I love the detail, but didn’t necessarily want Christmas stuff in one of my dollhouses year round. Then there’s the […]
I recently built the Gothic dresser and nightstand from SDK Miniatures to go in the bedroom of my Queen Anne Rowhouse, with the bed I scratch built. I bought SDK’s Gothic wardrobe too but it turned out to be too big for the room, so instead I put together a Cassidy Creations armoire. I also […]
I have been working on the gatorboard house’s barrel tile roof for two weeks, which is about one week and five days longer than I thought it would take. It hasn’t exactly been fun. I started by painting the tile sheets with gesso, thinking this would help the paint stick to the styrene. These are […]
Last year, I stumbled across a Jackie Deiber pull-apart dollhouse on eBay and snapped it up. I’d never seen one of these before, and haven’t seen one since… until last weekend, when this beauty popped up on eBay. No, I didn’t *need* it. (Especially not with the Little Belle and Bauder Pine Bill Lankford cottage […]
I recently added email alerts to the blog. If you want to get a brief, non-spammy email when I post a new blog, please sign up on the right sidebar. Years ago, I started a half scale porch vignette and never finished it. In the interest of finishing up some smaller projects before I dig […]
Following the not-so-great roof experience, I made a chimney for the Artist’s Cottage and it turned out pretty well. I feel like I’ve redeemed myself. :)
The reason for the chimney is that the Braxton Payne fireplace I bought extends past the roof line. Originally I thought about cutting the top of the fireplace down, but decided that cutting a hole in the roof and enclosing the visible top part with a chimney would be less likely to result in disaster. (Not to mention more realistic!)
Emily is a freelance writer, miniaturist, and adventure game enthusiast.
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