Dollhouse Report: Shabby chic bathroom, purple transfer ware, and a grand piano.

Dollhouse miniatures are a world unto their own, and one can find many others

who are obsessed with creating miniature interiors.  From traditional to victorian to 

antique and farmhouse, there is someone recreating a miniature world in every decor style.

My own dollhouse is going to be a fusion of styles, much like how I decorate my own home.

So the overall influence will be French, with some cottage and shabby chic style mixed in, 

then sprinkled with the vintage faded grandeur look I find so attractive.

This bathroom started with a kit of a tub, pedestal sink and a toilet at a reasonable price.

The cost of some of these miniatures are pretty expensive, so I have been trying to either 

customize ready to buy pieces that are unfinished wood or stay in a lower price bracket.

The customization of the pieces are the most fun for me.  I took an unfinished hall table 

and turned it into the shabby chic cottage dressing table in my bathroom.

After I painted it pink and white and added flowers to the drawers,

 I aged it with clear and dark wax and buffed it up.  At the last minute I was I inspired to add

a little skirt in pink gingham, which was the ruffled edge of a vintage Ralph Lauren pillowcase I 

had in my linens pile.  It added just the right amount of charm. I created a gilded cornice

to go over the long sheer linen drapery panel, a Stroheim and Romann remnant from my

curtain making decorating days as a designer. The rest is pretty much unfinished, as the moldings and the electrical and wall finishes need to be added.  So remember, this is a progress report!

I started off by painting the entire interior of the dollhouse in Ben Moore

Natural Elements (#1515),  the same color I have in my real life dining room.

It made it much more fun to set up the furniture pieces as they arrived, having

a painted backdrop instead of unfinished wood.

Here you can see I started placing various items in the rooms to get the feel

of how the rooms should be furnished.  On the top floor you can see the basic

bathroom kit. On the second floor I plan to have a bedroom on the left, the hall

in the center and the potting room that leads to the roof deck on the right.

On the first floor I will have the living room, foyer, dining room and then the 

big country kitchen ( cut off from view).

But then I got to thinking that the foyer was built too small and narrow. So I got the 

great idea of cutting open the wall.  And while I was at it, I wanted French doors to

go out onto the roof deck.  As it turned out there wasn't enough wall space to add

the doors to the roof deck because the stairs were right there (remember this was built

by someone from scratch, not a dollhouse kit, which I think has better floor plans).

So the French doors will go in between the kitchen and the dining room, just because it seems

to be the best place in this layout. 

I snapped this pic for Instagram, showing hubs at work cutting the walls.

He started using a Dremel with some kind of router but it didn't work very neatly

so he switched his tool choice to a coping saw (shaped like a giant U).

 This house is already a Fixer Upper lol.  

But look how much nicer it will be!!

The dining room will have a pair of columns along the new openings.

Oh yes, I have such grand ideas don't I??

I tried adding some wide pine floors by using a printed paper pattern I found

at a craft store, but I don't really care for the effect. 

 I will have to do real wood floors.

Oh well...but you may have noticed my dining room pieces that have 

purple transferware in the cupboard and on the table!

I almost died when I found a set of 52 pieces of purple transferware in 1/12 scale.

You can also see I started to build a railing on the staircase and have since added the banister.

I used instant wood glue and I almost glued my fingertips together.  

This tiny glueing is not easy.

Last but not least, my grand piano.

 This was the first group of miniature items I bought for my dollhouse.

You can see the black baby grand piano with the bench.  I planned to 

customize it to match the piano I had painted for my own home.

 I painted it in Old White chalk paint first. 

 Then to add the toile effect in blue paint, I decided to use colored pencils so I could get the fine

detail I needed to copy my own real life piano.

My real life toile piano...

The tiny bench seat was reupholstered in a velvet scrap I had from 

doing the gilded ballroom chairs. I even painted a tiny scene inside the 

lid of the piano.  It really looks adorable doesn't it?

I am having so much fun creating the interiors of the dollhouse,

and will be back soon to show off my next installment of progress.

Like wallpapering and finding an Aubusson rug....haha!!

I told you, this is so much fun!