Scooter67 Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 Has anyone here made their own doll house for their daughter? My daughter is wanting me to make her a doll house. My wife and I are not sure on how or even a good scale. My wife says it should be for a Barbie size and I am leaning for a small size doll. My big concern is how to design and then make it. I keep wanting to build it the way a real house is built by sheating, studs, and wall board. That is very time consuming. I was wondering if anyone has any idea on where I can find a good set of plans or if anyone has attempted something like this. All comments are welcome! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Onboard Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 I realize this doesn’t exactly answer your question, but this is what I get when I do a Google search results on doll house plans. However, I would have to say that the biggest problem with the Google search is that it brings up too many choices. I’m not sure how you would go about narrowing it down. Just a point of trivia, The New Yankee Workshop has a set of plans to build a doll house. If you clicked on the link you would see that this “doll house” is a small scale version of The New Yankee Workshop. Someone once asked Norm if there was a set of plans he could purchase so that he could build a stand alone workshop just like The New Yankee Workshop. Norm said, just purchase the Doll House plans and scale it up to the size you want. And, please don’t tell your wife that I told you this. Just to scratch the surface, if you want to build a doll house along the architectural model building lines, here’s a supplier for piecing together such a model. I’m sure there are many others out there. The only problem I’ve seen with architectural model building, is they don’t typically get into the level of detail you were talking about. Here’s a pdf that discusses some basic model building but there are no pictures. It does talk about scale though. This is where I got the supplier link. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlanWilley Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 If you can build a box out of sheet material then you can build a dolls house. i built one for my sisters girls many years ago. I made it from 3/8" ply for the walls and floors and roof just butt jointing it with glue. I made some coving for the ceilings out of some thin pine and used this to support the floors above. For the roof I used ply again and covered it with small squares of cardboard painted to imitate tiles. I hanged the full back wall for access and the front walls were hinged at each side of a central porch. the roof also opened on a hinge to give access to the attic rooms. I made the stairs from small offcuts of timber glued onto a piece of ply with a handrail made of thin dowel and tooth picks for spindles. I did not gat any photos of it unfortunately as it was many years ago before digital cameras. HTH. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TimV Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 I made this one from a photo my wife took at one of those kids play places. My daughter loved playing with it. It is not a dollhouse as you describe that replicates the look of a real house, but my daughter had lots of enjoyment with it regardless. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rapid Roger Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 I'm from the "po" side of town and have seen little girls using 3 or 4 cardboard boxes for a doll house and having a ball doing it. My point is that it doesn't have to be real hard to build or real fancy for kids to enjoy something. I'm sure you can come up with something that won't take you three months to build or cost $200 for materials and your daughter will be the envy of her friends. Now, if you are building it to suit you and your wife and have other adults to ooh and ah over, then there a lot of plans and even complete kits to be had. Some kits just require glue and about two weeks to build. Rog Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jHop Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 over 20 years ago, my father built a doll house sized for a barbie doll. I know where this doll house is, and should be able to get some photos within the next few days. Some quick dimensions (from the top of my head) are roughly 3 feet long, about a foot deep, and just about three feet thick. Most of the interior walls were just done as 1/2" plywood (the main material for the entire doll house, actually), without studs or framing of windows or doors. The porch had a railing, which has since suffered from years of play and is no longer available. He originally purchased cedar shingles for the roof, but never installed it. I didn't realize what they were for when I found them and started playing with them. This has three floors, door ways but no doors, and window openings but no windows. The exterior got painted (to match my grandparent's house at the time; I think he was trying to use up the last of the house paint) but only a few rooms got wallpaper, and most of that has been taken off. I don't remember if it has a staircase or not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jHop Posted October 4, 2011 Report Share Posted October 4, 2011 Alright, I got a "few" photos today. (I wasn't expecting to be able to get it done this fast. Circumstances worked out.) I'm only going to post a few selections, but I got almost 30 on file here. If you want more detailed photos, just let me know. (I don't do IM, but you can always send a message to me through here.) By the way, I spoke with my father (the builder) on this one, and this happened to be the prototype. He was not overly happy with the way it turned out, but it got played with by a lot of people, and stored for a while in an attic, and held up pretty well, so I'm thinking it's the basic "never satisfied" situation most woodworkers go through. most of the material is 3/8" Douglas Fir Plywood Glue and Brad nail construction. Frontal view: showing the lovely yellow that my grandparent's house was for many years. Three quarters: shows the roof angle/ separation. The cedar shingles were definitely supposed to go here, but didn't get left alone long enough. Interior shots Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scooter67 Posted October 6, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 I realize this doesn’t exactly answer your question, but this is what I get when I do a Google search results on doll house plans. However, I would have to say that the biggest problem with the Google search is that it brings up too many choices. I’m not sure how you would go about narrowing it down. Just a point of trivia, The New Yankee Workshop has a set of plans to build a doll house. If you clicked on the link you would see that this “doll house” is a small scale version of The New Yankee Workshop. Someone once asked Norm if there was a set of plans he could purchase so that he could build a stand alone workshop just like The New Yankee Workshop. Norm said, just purchase the Doll House plans and scale it up to the size you want. And, please don’t tell your wife that I told you this. Just to scratch the surface, if you want to build a doll house along the architectural model building lines, here’s a supplier for piecing together such a model. I’m sure there are many others out there. The only problem I’ve seen with architectural model building, is they don’t typically get into the level of detail you were talking about. Here’s a pdf that discusses some basic model building but there are no pictures. It does talk about scale though. This is where I got the supplier link. I also did a google search. I even got to a doll house making a website but it would never take me to a link title scratch building. I would not mind making a Doll house based on a real house and build it like a real house would be built but that is me. My wife thinks we should just make a plain looking one, paint the walls and get some Barbie furniture. I do not think my daughter really cares. May be when she gets to be in her later teens then get into the collecting mode and I can build a more Victorian type house. I have not found a good scale for a Barbie house to make a good plan. Using a 3D design software will make it fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scooter67 Posted October 6, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Alright, I got a "few" photos today. (I wasn't expecting to be able to get it done this fast. Circumstances worked out.) I'm only going to post a few selections, but I got almost 30 on file here. If you want more detailed photos, just let me know. (I don't do IM, but you can always send a message to me through here.) By the way, I spoke with my father (the builder) on this one, and this happened to be the prototype. He was not overly happy with the way it turned out, but it got played with by a lot of people, and stored for a while in an attic, and held up pretty well, so I'm thinking it's the basic "never satisfied" situation most woodworkers go through. most of the material is 3/8" Douglas Fir Plywood Glue and Brad nail construction. Frontal view: showing the lovely yellow that my grandparent's house was for many years. Three quarters: shows the roof angle/ separation. The cedar shingles were definitely supposed to go here, but didn't get left alone long enough. Interior shots I think this is the route I am going to take. My daughter is not into the whole collecting idea. She heard me say I would build her one so all she really cares is that I build one and she can play with it. I just wanted to build one that is played with and people go "hey, you did that...cool!". I need to start planning and figure out dimensions. Thank you for the help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jHop Posted October 7, 2011 Report Share Posted October 7, 2011 I need to start planning and figure out dimensions. Thank you for the help. No problem. you might be interested in some of the other photos, since I was lucky enough to remember to bring a tape measure that day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roscoelew Posted November 26, 2011 Report Share Posted November 26, 2011 Sometimes I see a bag of various parts second-hand when outside storage. If I see a bag to pick it up cheap. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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