Mockingbird Hill Cottage

Mockingbird Hill Cottage

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A Bit of Light on the Subject

December 20, 2019 at 10:32 am by Claudia

Since sun has been a rarity around here lately and yesterday was so cold that it was sunny all day long, I took some pictures of the most recent dollhouse addition. I don’t think we’d ever seen it in the sunlight before.

I’ve been forced to rest for the past couple of days and I spent a fair amount of time looking at dollhouses and dollhouse miniatures. When most miniaturists talk about restoring a dollhouse it usually involves a dollhouse of more recent vintage, such as my first restoration, Hummingbird Cottage. Or something vintage that was mass marketed, like old Lundby or Triang dollhouses. When you get into the area of vintage that is one-of-a-kind, well, you’re in an entirely new category.

The house I found last year right before Christmas is one-of-a-kind. It’s folk art. I haven’t messed with the outside. No painting, no retouching. I want to maintain its integrity. Even inside, with the dark wood interior, I am loathe to paint. So I’m resorting to temporary wallpaper to lighten things up. I feel strongly that folk art should be treated with respect.

So I’ve been wrestling with what to do with this ‘new’ house. Except for replacing some windows, cleaning the exterior, and cleaning the intact windows, I plan to leave the exterior as is. My first view of the exterior is what charmed me and it continues to do so. There’s no way I could do anything as charming as is already there. Nor would I want to.

The inside, however, is another story. Unlike the maker of the white house, who added detail to the room in the form of a built-in fireplace with bookshelves on either side, which I have no desire to change as it’s beautifully finished, this maker added two red fireplaces, and that’s it. Everything else is bare bones. The wood floors are large planks with spaces in between, unfinished. The walls are all painted yellow. There are two long rooms upstairs that could be divided. Everything could and should get a coat of paint.

I’m not a fan of the bright red fireplaces, but I would never paint over them. Instead, I’d fashion a surround, a facade, that could be removed. That way, the integrity of the maker’s original build would still remain.

The whole house is not quite to scale in that the ceilings are very low. So I’d have to choose furniture that was a bit on the smaller side, which, believe me, is entirely possible. Just because a piece is 1:12 scale doesn’t mean there aren’t slight variations out there. There are.

Just some of the ideas and quandaries running around inside my head as I contemplate the work ahead. I had no compunctions about doing whatever I wanted to Hummingbird Cottage, or to Don’s Studio, or to the ongoing restoration of the house I found at the Dump, or the modern dollhouse.

The two folk art houses are another story entirely.

Tricky stuff, this. But they sure generate ideas!

Feeling a bit better, by the way. Not tip-top yet, but less fuzzy.

Happy Friday.

 

Filed Under: dollhouse, vintage 18 Comments

Don’s Request

December 16, 2019 at 11:03 am by Claudia

I think I’ve got a touch of what Don has – the jury is still out, though. He feels pretty crappy. I feel pretty crappy. And wouldn’t you know it? Just as all the snow has melted, we’re due for a storm tomorrow that will bring us what could be several inches of snow, and in keeping with our track record from last year, we’ll be out there shoveling while feeling under the weather.

Good times!

Ah well. Such is life in the Northeast/Hudson Valley.

This morning, while we were sitting on the loveseat having our second cup of coffee, we were talking about the ‘new’ dollhouse and how much we love it on the kitchen table. (I know you know this, but we’re truly offbeat and funky and eclectic by nature.) Anyway, Don said – out of the blue – that he wished that we could put his miniature studio on the blue table in the living room. He never really sees it upstairs, as he’s usually there only to sleep and change his clothes.

I initially pooh-poohed the idea, saying that I wanted to keep the surface more open. But he kept at it and suggested that he bring it downstairs to see if it worked there.

To my surprise, it did.

Surrounded by that greenery, it looks like it could be sitting in artsy Topanga Canyon (Los Angeles). And, because of the open back and roof, so much light comes in! Plus, the splash of red works along with the other touches of red we have throughout the main floor.

It has a gold Christmas tree.

I was so touched. That, three years later, he still loves it and wants it right there where he can see it, means so much to me. It’s the only house – so far – that I built from the ground up. It was made from a kit supplied by miniatures (dot) com. Everything – the board & batten exterior, the design of the interior of the studio, and the decision to dispense with the roof – is mine. I furnished it with things I knew Don loved, so that, even if we couldn’t afford a real studio for him, he could have one in miniature. I made the Adirondack chairs, the desks, the fireplace, and the microwave cabinet. Everything else was ordered from artisans or was a gift from fellow miniaturists/blog readers.

So, now we have four dollhouses on the main floor of the house. Hummingbird Cottage, the vintage dollhouse in the den that I found last year, Don’s Studio, and the house Don is giving me for Christmas. I told Don that not many guys would go for this kind of thing, and his response was, “Are you kidding? I love them!”

May I say once more how lucky I am that this man is my life partner?

I spent a few hours cleaning the interior floors and walls of the ‘new’ house yesterday and it’s still  dirty! I’ll go at it again today. I imagine it was stored somewhere for a long time; an attic or a barn. I can see it sitting there, ignored for years, and it makes me sad. I’m so glad we rescued it.

I want to share part of a comment from Liz that was on yesterday’s post:

“A few months ago while at an antiques show I had looked at a sweet dollhouse in a vendor’s booth. The house had interior rooms which could only be viewed by removing the roof and some of the sides. I thought this was a very unusual design, and the dealer explained that many dollhouses were made in the exact floor plan of the child’s home – hence the interior walls & rooms.”

Now, that makes sense, doesn’t it?  It confirms our instinct about this house; that it was modeled after a real house. What an amazing creation!

Happy Monday.

Filed Under: dollhouse, Don, miniatures, vintage 42 Comments

Reindeer & Putz

December 13, 2019 at 10:53 am by Claudia

My visit to two different antique shops yesterday was disappointing. One, which is one of my favorites, didn’t have what I wanted. This shop has recently opened a new ‘warehouse’ so I stopped there, as well. SO disappointing! Yes, it’s a huge warehouse, but except for a couple of booths, it’s pretty junky. Like walking into Goodwill or the Salvation Army (at least the ones around here) but arranged with a bit more style. Sigh.

Anyway, I returned home feeling as if I’d wasted three hours. My reaction to all of this seemed to be a bit too strong and sure enough, come the evening, I started to feel under the weather. So that might explain it. Today, I’m also feeling crappy, but I’m not ‘have to stay in bed crappy.’ Hopefully, this will fade away quickly.

These are my vintage celluloid deer that I found several years ago and rediscovered when I pulled out the bins in the shed to decorate the real Christmas tree. I really love them. I’m guessing they were hung from a tree at one point.

I was rearranging the putz sheep yesterday and looked a bit more closely at this one:

Do you remember my saying that this girl had everything; the bow, the cloth/wool ears, the bell?

Well, she also has Germany stamped on her leg. She’s got it all, that girl!

I did stop at Michael’s yesterday and added this little picket fence to the scene on my shelf.

It’s a gray day today but I’ll try to take a photo of the entire scene as it is…so far. Because you know I’m going to putz a bit with my putz sheep.

Happy Friday.

 

Filed Under: Christmas, decorating, putz sheep, vintage 24 Comments

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Welcome!

Welcome!

I live in a little cottage in the country with my husband. It's a sweet place, sheltered by old trees and surrounded by gardens. The inside is full of the things we love. I love to write, I love my camera, I love creating, I love gardening. My decorating style is eclectic; full of vintage and a bit of whimsy.

I've worked in the theater for more years than I can count. I'm currently a voice, speech, dialect and text coach freelancing on Broadway, off Broadway, and in regional theater.

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