Saturday 2 October 2010

The beginning!

Have always wanted a doll's house and saw Montgomery Hall on Ebay! The Header pic above is the one that was on Ebay and I must admit I just loved it. It was also relatively close to where I live and decided to go for it. I had already seen Montgomery Hall on the Doll's House Emporium website and felt it was a good first house. Loved the different shaped rooms and the hall.


I have intially painted the outside with a mix of sand and paint to create a texture. Plans in the future include using a brick effect stencil, but for now just wanted to freshen it up and fix the front which didn't close properly.



Started with the roof which was stripped of paper and wooden strips are being fitted to be painted grey to give a textured tiled effect. This is ongoing at present. Really could not believe how very expensive 1/12th scale real tiles are!

The inside of the house was already wallpapered and had felt carpets - the plan is to completely strip the existing wallpaper and remove all the felt carpets. This has not been my favourite job and I have started with the rooms on the right hand side. I have removed the felt carpet on the bottom hall and keep looking at all those stairs! Thankfully the house was already fitted with lights.



This is the original interior with a few pieces of furniture bought from Ebay - hated the house being completely empty but now regret buying furniture before I had decided how I wanted the house to look or indeed had properly researched Georgian houses! Apparently Montgomery Hall was based on Fairfax House which is a Georgian townhouse in York. So I have had a good look at their website and notice lots of marble floors and grandeur, realising I have bought more from the Victorian era than the Georgian era.


The only thing I don't regret buying is the little 1/12th scale basset which I couldn't resist! Here he is in the first room I decided to work on !


Although I wasn't at all sure that a basset would have existed in a Georgian town house a helpful comment left on the DHE forum made me realise I could work a basset, or indeed two, into the plans for my house!


"The first application of the word "Basset" to a breed of dog can be traced to La VĂ©nerie, an illustrated text on hunting written by Jacques du Fouilloux in 1561. Fouilloux illustrates wire-haired bassets resembling the modern Basset Fauve de Bretagne. but In 1866, Lord Galway imported a pair of Le Couteulx Bassets to England, but it was not until 1874 that Basset Hounds were widely introduced there by Sir Everett Millais. There is heaps more history on Wikipedia and your family could have brought one over from France before Lord Galway. !"


The forum is proving to be an invaluable resource!



This is the above room - now a study/library!

The 'ship' is waiting for a shelf at present hence sitting on the floor! The ceiling has still to be completed but after four weeks of lots of work with lots of assistance I am happy!

Had great difficulty with the mitred edges despite help with a mitre block etc. It became even more complicated when I decided the room was too 'box' like and we should put in a chimney breast and fire. Had to then recut everything! Not helped by Bailey constantly stealing 'my' sticks! Martha is of course terrified of the whole endeavour!

The next room will be much simpler!

Not sure my actual house will ever be the same again - looks like the proverbial bomb has indeed hit us!

7 comments:

  1. How exciting to see your dollhouse coming along! Mom says the best part is that you can close the doors to keep out the dust! Dusting a dollhouse is NO FUN!

    Love ya lots
    Maggie and Mitch

    ReplyDelete
  2. oh I am now suffering DHE. Dolls House Envy, it is so so so so beautiful. And you are soooooo clever. Always wanted one of these, and possibly the way I am going I always will.

    Never thought of looking on eBay for one, even though I sell on there occasionally.

    My problem is the upstairs of my real house needs my decorating attention and I am not very good at the 'real' decorating stuff! I think you are really clever. Your DH is beautiful.

    J x

    ReplyDelete
  3. It is looking very good. You can always resell the bits the don't want...or save them for your second dollshouse! :~D

    ReplyDelete
  4. We are going to LOVE to watch the development of this doll house. This is a hobby Moma had never considered ... honestly, M & M's mom is the first person she has known who has had one or had interest in one. So it's new territory. But VERY MUCH something she would love. So she'll love it vicariously!

    Thanks for making this blog! We LOVE the layout!

    xxoo
    J and F

    ReplyDelete
  5. For things to get better, it's got to get worst first! :) You'll get there soon enough ... we think it's coming along very nicely ... our place is a bomb too!

    Tee and the Dog Woods gang

    ReplyDelete
  6. Came back to tell ya ... Moma checked out a book from the library the other day. It's called The Complete Dolls' House Book. You got her curious and interested. The bad thing about that is ... now there's one MORE distraction to keep her from helping us with our blog.

    Grumble
    Jake and Fergi
    xxoo

    ReplyDelete
  7. Uh oh. Moma doesn't even have a Georgian Dolls' House, but now she's got ANOTHER book from the library: Miniature Embroidery for the Georgian Dolls' House. It's brim full of projects for the time period 1703-1830. Carpets. Stair carpets. Rugs. Curtains. Cushions. Chair covers. Footstools. (Canvas. Embroidered. Patchwork. Quilted. Three-fold screens. Fire screens. Table coverings. Pictures and Samplers. Bed Hangings and Bed Covers. And more. It's amazing. You've gotten her so curious and so interested. She's gonna enjoy one vicariously ... thanks to you!

    One good thing: when she pours over the books, we get to cuddle up next to her!

    Enjoy! We sure are!
    Jake and Fergi
    xxoo

    ReplyDelete