The Mounfield is resting....

Well actually, not much has happened since last time I wrote.
I somehow managed to get fed up with painting windows and just put the whole thing aside. Mountfield just stands all on it's own now, waiting for me to continue...But I really don't feel like it at the moment. - Sorry!
I have another small dolls house kit, that I work on currently and it'll have a blog of it's own once I'm finished. Because it's so small, I'm very sure that it will be finished. ;-)

- I will get back, working on the Mounfield, but it might be months...who knows?
Come back later this year :-)

What's happening now?

I'm currently putting the side panels/walls on the Mountfield using little magnets and I just need to screw the hinges to the front panel before it's done.
Then I need to add the last pieces of "bricks" to the curved bay window wooden pieces of the front panels, to be placed underneath the bay windows.
A few days ago, I painted one bay window - You can't imagine the amount of time I spend on it!
I counted 80 little edges total, at the front and on the back sides of the plexi glass windows, which needed to be painted very carefully.
I'm using a small brush to paint the windows and it's a complete nightmare!
I stille have one bay window and two small windows to go, before being done with the exterior features.
- Next time I'll paint windows and doors etc. using a can of spray paint!

New double door

Closing the opening in the wall

This is a double french door that I'm changing, so that it doesn't have all the panes as before. I replaced the panes with 1 mm cardboard. It's not easy to see on this picture, but I'm filling the little square holes with balsa wood.There will also be plexi-glass in the top panes, once it's done.

This is the door after being painted. It still needs some glossy varnish and doorknobs. This is the kitchen and through the little panes you can see the light in the diningroom.

Change of plans...

New bed.
The first piece of furniture in this dolls house. I liked this fabric for the double bed, but I didn't think it suited the wallpaper with the roses (in the master bedroom), so I decided to switch rooms. This room was supposed to be the girl's room but the colour on the wall suited this bed much better. I'm not sure about the carpet though - I might change it for a "bordeaux" coloured?
I made the bed out of balsa wood and a piece of thick card. - The fabric is some kind of creme coloured polyester with rose print.

Lamp for the livingroom

The lamp from Euro Minis is hanging in the livingroom, but it's been painted with an antique gold paint and I glued some fabric on to the plastic shades. It's the same fabric that I'll be making the armchairs for the room of, later on.

Here the lights are on!

Light in the bedroom

The bedroom ceiling lamp.
Made basically of amber coloured pearls, thin metal wire, a strip of card and some paint.
This was actually supposed to be made of transparent pearls, but I didn't have enough of those to make a lamp like this. Maybe I'll make a new one someday, if I get some transp. pearls of the same size?

This is the bedroom ceiling lamp when the light is on.

A little something to read about the 1940's

Click here: Description of 1940's living/The Discovery Channel

Let there be light!

The kitchen lamp.

Another handmade lamp (to keep down the expenses!). Made with a ball shaped bulp on wire and a paper shade, with glossy varnish. Some metal wire, a pearl/ornament and some metallic paint. Very simple.

It's inspired by the type of lamp called "shoemaker lamp". It was a somewhat common lamp from the late 19th (maybe earlier?) to mid 20th century, in common homes (Denmark).

This is a table lamp for the small office.

This turned out to be difficult to "install", 'cause there wasn't any hole for the wire and I had to drill and cut etc. to make a hole - the house is already assembled and when I did this, I didn't know where to put the extra lights and therefor I didn't prepare for any lamps, other than the ceiling lamps, which holes has been predrilled from the dolls house factory.

It's quite difficult to add lamps to this kind of dolls house which has three openings and the wires must be "invisible". I just don't think one ceiling lamp for each room is enough. - I want more lights such as table lamps and standard/floor lamps, maybe also walls lights? Another difficulty to this lamp, was that the wire wasn't long enough to reach the back of the house...I added some more wire though, but it wasn't easy since I had to cover the joined ends with tiny pearls and glue. - It does work though, luckily! :o)

At last, I got to see if my homemade lamp would look nice with the lights on. The wires wasn't soldered on before yesterday, so I'm glad to see that it works and it turned out pretty well I think.

Electricity in the dolls house

A close up of the wires soldered to the copper tape.

Here's a close up of the power fuse. The black wire is from the power supply and is soldered to the copper tape/power fuse. - This type of dolls house electricity, isn't beautiful, but it works impeccably.

Copper tape is placed on the backside of the dolls house.

Lighting in the hallway and the dining room

Hallway light.
Here's a close up of the new lamp. I made it out of different parts such as beads/pearls, transparent plastic lit, cheap dolls house lamp (the part stuck to the ceiling) and some metal wire etc.

View of the hall with the new lamp.

Dining room light.
This lamp is bought, but when I got it out of it's package, it really wasn't hanging straight. So I had to change the chains with some new ones and they are a little bit larger in the "chain rings", but I think it works well anyway. It's called a hanging lamp with beaded shade by the way, and will do well in an Art Deco styled home too.

Bricks under the bay windows

The facade takes shape. There's going to be bricks under both windows and perhaps also in the front door area? We'll see...

Faux brickwork

Painted cardboard (0,75mm) is glued to the "wood pieces" (whatever it's called?) which will be placed on the front of the house below the bay windows.

Upstairs/downstairs

On the first floor a carpet and doors has been added. The doors aren't glued in place, as they need some varnish first. - Oh, and door knobs also ;o)

The staircase and carpet has been added to the hallway.

Views of some of the rooms

Above:  View of the masterbedroom in the firstfloor and the diningroom below.

View of the hallway, the bathroom and the kitchen.

More rooms being painted and wallpapered

- This is going to be the girl's room.

This will become the diningroom. The kitchen will be in the back and on the right hand will be the livingroom.

This is the hallway, just waiting for the staircase and yes, pretty much everything else, which should be in a hallway...

The bathroom from the 1930's has a touch of art deco to it. The floor here isn't glued in place, since there's no light in the kitchen yet, which is right underneath. Once the kitchen light is in place, the bathroom floor will be as well.

Meet the family

(For further information, look to the right of this blog!)

The daughter of the house:

The man of the house:

And the woman of the house:

This small room is shown as the bathroom in the catalogue from DHE. I didn't want such a small bathroom and with only one child in this dolls house family ;o) - well, then this will become the office of the mother!

Painting and wallpapering

Top: The bedroom, roses on creamy white background. A free printable wallpaper from Jennifer's printables.

Above: First room to get a "makeover" was the kitchen. It's a "soft creamy" yellow colour, I saw somewhere on the internet in a picture of a 1940's kitchen, whilst researching the era.

Getting a feeling of the result

Here the whole dolls house is drybuild. You get the feeling of what it will look like one day...
I have already decided that I don't want it to look like the DHE version, shown on the box.
But at this point, I had a few ideas of a color scheme and no final look chosen.

Drybuilding the dolls house

Top: View of the right hand side. The staircase will be just behind this wall.

Above: View of the front side.

Will it fit I wonder? Drybuilding the dolls house before gluing etc. is essential. ;o)

What is what?

How to get started? To many walls and bits...

The Mountfield - arriving in Denmark

Four days after ordering the Mountfield at DHE, these two boxes arrived at my front door. Although it was January, it felt like Christmas eve, as it felt when I was a child. - I just love having a brand new project! :o)