The Big House Remodel
Way back in the dark ages, my father and I built a dollhouse following the plans of Windflower Manor by Jackie Kerr Deiber.
I was fourteen. I loved that dollhouse. I floored it, wallpapered it, electrified it, and furnished it on my shoestring budget.
Over the years some of my shoestring decorating has deteriorated, and I’ve decided to update and renovate it.
The dollhouse is solidly built of 1/2″ plywood. It’s front opening and has 11 rooms on four floors (the original plans have 12, but I took out a wall because I wanted a bigger room).
The rooms have a depth of 16 inches–room heights on the first two floors are 12 inches, and ten inches on the upper floors. The whole house is 36″ wide and about four and a half feet high.
In other words, big. (Hence its name: The Big House)
This is the facade–you can see where I’ve already dismantled the porch. The siding is bowing and cracking and will be replaced with stucco.
Here’s the interior. I’ve already started on the bottom floor.
Since this is a cabinet-style house, I plan to treat each room as though it was a room box, and try to do something innovative with each one.
I’ve decided not to go with a period interior, or go for one style–it will be a fantasy house where the rooms don’t have to make sense in relation to one another. Each will be its own picture (though I want to strive for a pleasing effect when the room are looked at all at once). I want to experiment with lighting, false walls, and fool-the-eye techniques.
In other words, have fun and see what happens.
See the following pages to follow the room-by-room remodel:
Utilities Room (former Kitchen)
Fourth floor coming soon
