It was so pretty, with a tiled roof and red brick walls, tiny flower pots of pink roses standing by the front door and a little fireplace in the main room. It had two floors, plus the attic in the roof section and I loved it so much! Now whenever I think of my dad, I think of that dolls house and the hours of woodwork he put into making it for me. That, and the horse-box and wooden show jumps he also made for my Barbie horse, Prancer.
I can clearly remember holding my mum's hand and walking to the toy shop so that we could pick out furniture for the new dolls house. I spent a happy hour or so, choosing lamps, sofas, chairs, tables and so on, so that I could make my dolls a lovely place to live. I didn't really role-play with the dolls, but I did play with the dolls house a lot, because I loved sewing tiny curtains and cushions, crocheting rugs for the floors and knitting little blankets for the beds. I had so much fun designing that house and making it unique. I even gave it seasonal makeovers! None of my friends had a dolls house like mine. They had shop bought ones made from plastic, and none of them had working lights or windows that opened up or locked at night when the dolls were asleep. I felt very proud of my dad for his skill in making such a fabulous house and I just loved making things for it myself.
Years later, when I was about 21, I started to collect Doll House magazine, which came with small kits each month. The idea was that you could make an entire doll's house, plus all the furnishings and build it up month by month. My ex-fiancé was the one who made up the items of furniture for me - a comfy padded armchair in a shabby chic fabric, a lovely Welsh dresser he painted with mahogany wood stain, a dining table etc. After several months however, I still didn't have any part of the actual doll house - just a few sticks of furniture for a house that kept being promised by the magazine but the parts of which never seemed to be in upcoming issues. Once I realised that it would take over three years to get all the parts to build the house itself, I lost interest and feeling very disheartened, I cancelled my subscription. I gave the sticks of furniture away and they have ended up in someone else's dolls house instead, but it was my ex-fiancé who made them.
A few years later, I went on holiday to Strathpeffer for the first time and there I visited the Children's Museum which was full of beautiful dolls houses, mostly from the Victorian and Edwardian periods. They had so much history attached to them, plus spooky tales of dolls moving by themselves in the middle of the night, or being moved by the spectral hand of a ghost child. Again, I fell in love with the idea of having another dolls house, but I pushed it to the back of my mind. Still, the idea never left me and I would ponder on the possibility of one day having a dolls house of my own again. This fancy resurfaced when I saw the new Wuthering Heights film and the stunning dolls house that is in the dining room at Thrushcross Grange. And this time, I wasn't going to talk myself out of it!
So I went house hunting and I found the most perfect dolls house! As you can see from the pictures in this post, it's a large, traditional Victorian-style house on a scale of 1:12. It has three floors - and it's pink!!! I have never seen a pink traditional dolls house before - usually they are grey, beige, blue or cream. But of course, mine had to be pink and as soon as I saw it I knew it was meant for me. It has a white balcony and veranda, bay windows, dormer windows in the roof and pretty mouldings. It's just perfect for me! It is an early birthday gift to myself. Last year I created my own beautiful shimmering pink bedroom as my birthday treat to myself, this year I have purchased the pink dolls house of my dreams!
It arrived yesterday and it took me and my mother over five hours to put all the different components together and build the house. The pieces were quite heavy so it took two people to build it - one to hold the pieces in place while the other fixed the screws. Parts of it were very fiddly and used some of the tiniest brass screws I've ever seen. The windows and doors are empty frames, so I can choose my own decorative film with which to glaze them. The inside is a completely blank canvas, meaning that I get to choose wallpaper, paint, curtains and floor coverings, or I can leave it as the polished pine wooden interior it came with, plus of course, I can decide on the style of furniture I want to fill it with. It's all so exciting!
The house now sits proudly in my study and makes a real statement in that room. Getting it upstairs was a job and a half because its so heavy. It's big enough that its more like an item of furniture in its own right. It's certainly not a toy, but was purchased from a proper miniaturist dolls house emporium.
I remember one of my old editors was a keen dolls house enthusiast and she had already made over a couple of houses and had just bought her third when she retired. She often mentioned visiting dolls house fairs and markets, getting so excited when she found just the right piece for a room she was creating. I suppose its the female equivalent of a man building a train track in his loft or having his own workshop to make things in. Men like making model trains, planes and automobiles, but women like to create lovely homes, even miniature ones in the form of a dolls house. It's the nesting instinct in us.
My new dolls house is an indoor hobby I am really looking forward to and one that I have never tried before, at least not in a serious way in adulthood. I learnt my lesson with Doll House magazine all those years ago, and this time, I made sure I bought the house first! I have purchased a few little items for the house already though - a red bicycle, a golden birdcage and stand with a tiny white bird inside, a dapple grey rocking horse, a white piano and matching stool, a golden harp, a little cat and the teeniest goldfish bowl which is just adorable. I also have pink floral fabrics ready to start making curtains, but I need to source the wallpapers first, before I decide which fabrics to use.
I can't wait to get started on decorating the inside of my beautiful pink and white dolls house. I already know that the interiors will also be done in pink and white too. It will be a good way to relax and to be creative, but as its a quiet hobby, unlike skating, riding, dancing etc., my dolls house should be something that I can do softly at home, over a long period of time. My head is already brimming with ideas and design questions - do I really want to include a boring bathroom and kitchen, or should I have a music room and a library instead? What furniture do I want; shall I do hard floors or carpets? Do I want a human family of dolls for it, or an animal family? I'm leaning more towards an animal family, or perhaps a pretty cat or mouse living alone in her chic little cottage ala Brambly Hedge, or Claris!
I have already purchased two pretty model cherry-blossom trees and I plan to fix one to each side wall of the house. With this is mind, I have decided to name my dolls house Cherry Blossom Cottage. I'm also going to glaze the doors with a stained glass model film, and perhaps do a rose pink film on the windows to give the house a rosy glow when its lit from within, because of course, I'm going to have working lights in all the rooms - my dad set the bar high!
It's going to be so much fun designing this project and I'm so glad that I finally have the dolls house I have wanted for decades. My dad might have made my first dolls house for me when I was seven, but I am certainly following in his footsteps - I plan on making my own dream of a dolls house come to life. Oh, I do love a good craft project! This one is going to keep me going for years. It's a pretty pink birthday treat to myself and its been a very long time coming!
Serene Blessings
Marie x
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