A 1/12th scale version of Mary Poppins’ umbrella – what more is there to say 
The Dolls House Emporium also sell a version of Mary Poppins’ carpet bag, which would be perfect for my Curiosity shop as well, except it’s made of resin so I may have to source some fabric and make my own.
As curiosities go, this is a must. Quite delightful.
Since the start of the year I’ve collated a few new items for my Curiosity shop (not all shown in the photo):
From the Dolls House Emporium:
From Ebay:
I’ve made a few modifications already. The ink pot came with the feather glued into it, so I carefully removed it with tweezers. The feather was covered down to the tip so I removed the lower part leaving part of the shaft bare. Then I cut the end of the shaft to a point and coloured the end with a permanent marker to look like ink.
The pink and blue biscuit barrels are lovely but their handles look like copper wire and don’t do the barrels justice. They were simply hooked on and folded over, so I unfolded and removed them which in my mind makes them look of a higher quality.
The jelly moulds and measuring cups are very good but look a tad too shiny and new for my shop. I’m tempted to do a little work on them to age them, along the lines of this post.
The umbrella handle I may alter a little, it’s not as realistic as I’d like.
The small pewter ornate pot and lid is beautiful. When it arrived it was clear there was a manufacturing fault, a bit of extra metal means the lid doesn’t fit. The seller offered a full refund but it was too delightful to return especially as all the others had the same fault. I know someone who can fix it for me, and in the mean time it still looks very pretty sat on the dressing table, lid by the side as if in use (see photo). In fact it’s one of my favourite items.
Just after Christmas in a spontaneous moment I decided that having the bedroom’s front wall attached to the roof didn’t work for me. My instinct every time was to open it outwards rather than lift it up, so I heated up the joints thus melting the pva and removed it. Next the top sloping edge was removed with a router so it was flat. Then the door was hinged in place in its new position. The grooves where the supports used to go will be covered by beams. This all took several months, I lost confidence with my ‘kit bashing’ and it took ages to work out the details. There is one flaw which is that you need to lift the roof slightly to allow the wall to open past the main roof, but I still prefer that to having the wall lift up. I still need to add a magnet, but it’s almost there. Would I ‘kit bash’ again – maybe – but there were several moments when I wondered if I made a mistake, however now it’s complete I’m much happier.
I came across a wooden tub, goblet, vase and bowl by chance when hunting in the depths of my sewing box, I’d completely forgotten I had them. I bought them years ago, long before I knew of this hobby, but to my delight several are almost to scale (or at least the goblet will be once I make it a chalice) – I’ve added in some of my 1/12th scale items to the photo for comparison.
All the items are natural wood, the only thing is they each have a hole where they were originally tied together so I need to find a matching piece of dowel to cut and plug them. I’ve already started working on the vase, creating a chip carving of a star using a craft knife. Not sure whether to carve any more details into it or leave it as one centre piece. I then need to decide which finish to use on it to best show up the carving. The bowl I think I will stain dark brown. The goblet is too big for 1/12 scale (as you can see compared to the dark wooden goblet) but looks the right size to be made into a chalice, or maybe cut down to make a bowl. The tub is small but could be used to hold some items in the shop.
First of all I needed to decide for definite how I was going to ‘cobble’ the street. Having tried several methods I choose Richard Stacey’s grey cobbles (to be glued on with PVA and then grouted the same as the brick slips). These are 2-3mm thick, so I removed 2mm from the bottom of the front wall to allow for the extra thickness and for the hinges dropping slightly over time.
When I offered the wall up it was clear that the side walls of the house had bowed slightly (not sure why – maybe the weight of the brick slips, maybe from painting the mdf and not using a pva/water mix first, maybe my angles were slightly out – I’ll never know). In reality the difference was only about 1mm, but it was enough to stop me for a bit while I worked out the best way round it. The picture shows the issue – if you look at the line of white paint to the right of the front wall you can see it’s a little thicker at the top than the bottom. To even out the difference I decided to align the front wall to the side wall at the point where the beam between top and bottom floors runs (which is how it is in the photo).
I attached the hinges in place on the inside of the side wall first. Then to mark the position of the hinges on the front wall I lay some cobbles out loosely and placed the wooden spacer on top of the cobbles (spacer came with the kit). I found it easier to use two spacers, so made another one out of a bit of spare mdf and some sheets of paper to bring it up to the right height. I then put double sided tape on the hinges, aligned the wall and pressed it in place. I put some clamps over the hinges as well to hold them in place, then opened the door and drilled the starting holes (with a hand drill) and then put in the screws. More complicated than the instructions, but I wanted to get the wall aligned at the point half way up to even out any gap.
Finally the wall was in place I started putting a few of the brick slips in place on the two edges of the front wall, sanding some of the depth off the lower ones to disguise the gap. However I found that it’s a lot fiddlier applying brick slips with the wall vertical – they fall off/slide down slightly or at least they do when I keep knocking them So I’ve just applied a few key ones meaning that when I remove the door and apply the rest I’ll know what depth to sand them to.
The window frame still needs ‘weathering’ and staining but as the front wall is now hinged in place I couldn’t resist a photo of my curiosity shop so far, taken through the window
I’m currently reading the March edition of The Dolls House Magazine. It’s only the second dolls house magazine I’ve read, but this particular edition feels as if it could have been written for my Curiosity Shop. There are articles and photos on:
I think my copy will be well worn by the end, lots of inspiration, information and even step by step instructions. Worth checking out.
I’m thrilled to say that the Dolls House Emporium, the company who I bought the Stratford Bakery kit from and several of the accessories, wrote a post all about The Tiny Keyhole recommending Dolls House lovers everywhere to check it out. You can read the post and see links to some of their other posts here. They also advertised the post on Facebook and Twitter and on their forum! Thank you Dolls House Emporium!!
A couple of new items for my Curiosity shop which I found on Ebay. Firstly two porcelain vases and a large plate each displaying a picture of a regency lady and gentleman. Plus a wooden sewing box with opening lid and draw, complete with sewing accessories.
