The Den of Slack

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McKinley – the “before” shots

This was a TOTALLY unplanned purchase. I had been going along my merry way on the Fairfield, having a great time working in half scale, planning out all the other half scale houses I’d build next. I went so far as to buy back issues of Nutshell News that contained half scale house and furniture plans. Then BAM! I came across this assembled McKinley for a reasonable price – less than half what the unassembled kit would cost – and I had to have it. I made a special trip to pick it up. My boyfriend commented that I’m the only person he knows who would go 60 miles out of her way to buy a dollhouse. (I’ve also been known to drive this far for baby hamsters. But that’s beside the point! Anyway, I’m GLAD I’m the only girl he knows who would drive so far for a dollhouse…)

The house has clearly been loved over the years. I got the impression it’s 20-30 years old. Here are the pictures the seller emailed me. She didn’t say that it was a McKinley, but I recognized it right away…

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Fairfield – siding, windows, and doors

I’m nowhere near putting the windows and doors in this thing… but HBS had a 50% off sale on April 1st, and I used my coupon to buy the “upgrade kit” for the Fairfield. It includes 11 windows, 4 interior doors, and 1 exterior door (all Houseworks pieces).

How they’ll look. The windows are thicker than the width of the plywood, so I may add siding to the exterior of the house to compensate.

Dollhouse Miniatures had a how-to article a few months ago for doing stained glass windows. It was written by an artisan I like (whose name I can’t think of right now, of course!) I once saw his work at a show and for years regretted not buying a piece. Finally I saw him again at another show and got a hutch with stained glass doors. I’m looking forward to trying the technique and comparing my results to his!

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Fairfield – assembling the shell

With the stairs done, I was ready to move on to Step 4. I was surprised to see that this step was assembling the shell! On the Orchid, assembling the shell didn’t come until much later in the project.

I punched out many, many pieces, and got to work on sanding them. One piece split a little (a chunk of the top layer of plywood came off right above an interior doorway). I tried gluing it back on but it didn’t look like it would hold. I guess I can always fill it with woodfiller.

Here are the exterior walls, soaking up sanding sealer. I’m going to paint them an olive green color.

I decided to paint the ceilings this time (rather than covering them with paper like I did in the Orchid).

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