Sunday, May 5, 2013

My Amersham

I'm glad to say my husband, daughter and dolls house arrived home in one piece last night.

This is my mock tudor Amersham doll house. I am really pleased with it. It needs a bit of restoration but it is such a sweet little house. It is hard to date Amersham houses but it would date somewhere between the 1930s and mid 1950s. I think this one is probably post-war but I'm not sure.

This is the house as it came home last night.

This is the house today. I sat up until midnight stripping the paper off the base last night.

 The house with its garage doors open.

 The inside. The garage, bottom left, had floral paper on the walls when it came. 
I quickly stripped that to return it to the garage it is supposed to be.

 There is a little bay upstairs on the door where one or two pieces of furniture could go.

The house will need rewiring for safety. I have started pulling back the layers of old wallpaper to find the original papers underneath. I won't be able to save the old wallpapers but I will know what reproduction papers to look out for to return the house to its former glory. So far I have uncovered two different tulip patterned wallpapers. The upstairs windows have  been replaced with plastic ones so I will need to keep an eye out for vintage replacements which do come along now and then.

The house, while it looks grand, is a smaller scale, 1/16th I think. The height of the house including the base is 18 inches and the width of the base is 26 inches.

Inside the house was a 1970s/1980s Hobbys of London plastic fire place and 1970s Lundby pictures as shown below:

 1970s Lundby pictures.

1970s/1980s plastic Hobbys fire place.
This has now found a home in my 1970s Toyworks house.
It fits neatly under the stairs.
 
I quite like the thought that many decades ago a little girl received this house new and played with it and then in the 1970s another little girl played with it, and it has probably been played with since. It has a history.

Anyway I'd better start getting ready for bed. Work tomorrow. It is now 10.00pm in New Zealand.

5 comments:

  1. Привет!
    Поздравляю с приобретением. Я думаю в ваших руках дома приобретут прекрасный былой вид! Удачи!
    Татьяна

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love tudors, there are so many interesting scenes to do in them, cant wait to see more!

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  3. Hi Sharee! What fun! Both of the houses are diamonds in the rough but I am eagerly waiting to see what you will make them into. It's playtime for you for a while! Will that lovely collection of furniture from the auction go into either of them?

    elizabeth

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    Replies
    1. Unfortunately not Elizabeth. I will have to keep a look out for some suitable furniture from the right period and in the right scale.

      Delete
  4. Que buen trabajo estas haciendo, seguro que quedaran preciosas.
    besitos ascension

    ReplyDelete