How to Make Modern Dollhouse Furniture Tutorial

I've gotten a few requests on how to make dollhouse furniture.  I know I mentioned that I would post my instructions but to be honest have been delaying it because I didn't take great pictures when I made the furniture for my daughters dollhouse earlier this year.  Sometimes when I make things I just make it up as I go along, so I also don't have the greatest measurements or instructions.  If you are the type of person that needs exact measurements then this tutorial is not for you.  I am simply going to tell you what I did, but not give you exact measurements.  You can tape the pieces together and adjust as necessary.

Acrylic Egg Modern Chair:
Materials:
Plastic Round ornament that opens in half
Plastic champagne cup (you only need to use the bottom of the cup, the cups need to be the ones with the detachable base)

Use only one half of the ornament and hot glue to the base of the champagne glass.  I also took a piece of fabric to make a cushion for the chair.

Modern Arco Lamp (Arched Metal Ball Lamp)
Materials:
20 gauge wire in silver (16 or 18 gauge would work too)
Plastic Silver Ball ornament (I got mine from Target, you want to buy one that is the same scale as your dollhouse)
Hand saw
Drill

Cut ornament as shown above (a little more than 3/4s of the ornament) with a hand saw.  Use caution when cutting ornament it is thicker than you would think. Use a drill and drill a small hole for wire to loop through.  Attach wire on through hole and bend to make a T shape so wire does not fall thought.  Loop wire to other half of ornament (this is your base).  The base will be too light to support the lamp so add weights to the bottom of base.  I hot glued quarters to the  bottom of my base (if you have kids quarters are a choking hazard, so make sure that the quarters are very secure).

Modern Sofa
Materials:
Kids Play Foam Mat (only one square is needed)
Exacto Knife

Cut our 4 pieces from the foam mat. One for the back of the sofa, two side arms and one for the base of the sofa. 

The back and base of the sofa are the same size, arms are also the same size.  For the arms of the sofa I angled it slightly on one side to create a slight recline on the sofa.  Note how the arms of the sofa needs to be longer (width of base plus depth of base).

Tape your sofa together and adjust measurements if necessary.

Cut out another rectangle shape.  This will the the sofa cushion.  Cut out two more smaller shapes for the back pillow cushions.   Glue only the base together. While base is drying take fabric (I used old grey work pants) and wrap the cushions.  I glued them onto the foam with Aleenes Tacky Glue.

 I don't have pictures on how to glue the fabric onto the foam but you want to make sure that any seems will be in a logical place where they won't be seen.  When base is done wrap base with fabric.  Base is trickier to wrap because you will see more seams.  I made bias strips with the fabric to cover the seams.  For the legs of the sofa glued small wooden pieces to the bottom of the sofa.  Again if this is for small children I would skip this step as it could be a choking hazard.

Pouf was crocheted and rug was a piece of fur that I cut to shape. Semi circle chairs are made of foam and cardboard also.  Will try to post tutorial on that when I have a chance.

A Little Dollhouse Update (DIY and New Dollhouse Furniture)

I've been having lots of fun decorating Avery's new dollhouse.  Dollhouse furniture is surprisingly very expensive, so I decided to make my own.  This dollhouse is very addicting   If you love making things, you could spend hours crafting stuff for a dollhouse.  Below I made the sofa, lamp, side chair and pouf.  The rug is a piece of fur that I cut to size and the coffee table is a small table that I found at Dollar Tree.  Dollar Tree does sell cheap dollhouse furniture, but it is the wrong scale.  My dollhouse is 1:12, but the Dollar Tree/Dollar General dollhouse furniture is 1:18 scale I think.  So the coffee table was suppose to be a dining table, but since it was too small I cut the legs shorter and made it into a coffee table.  The pieces I cut off I actually used for the legs of the sofa.

I'm still experimenting with layout of the house.  

I also purchased a kitchen from Hobby Lobby for the dollhouse.  I love this dollhouse modern kitchen, it has a french door refrigerator!  All the cabinet doors open and its pretty well made.  The modern kitchen was on the pricey side, $44.99 (in store), but they had a 40% off coupon (which you can just show them on your mobile phone), so it came out ot 30 dollars.  Thirty dollars is still pricey but cheaper than any other dollhouse kitchen set I found.  Ebay has some sets from China, but with shipping all the sets were over 40 dollars.

Hobby Lobby modern kitchen.   Pots, pans and baskets were not part of the set.

All of the cabinets open which is pretty cool.

I will publish tutorials (when I have time) on the furniture, which can be scaled for Barbie also.

Building a Real Dollhouse

I've been building a dollhouse.  Not a premade easy assembly Costco dollhouse. This is a real dollhouse,  one where you have to paint every wall, stain the floors and shingle the roof.  I have to admit when I first saw this dollhouse online I was super excited.  Then when I received it and opened the box I felt overwhelmed.  The dollhouse sat in the corner of our room for months (8 months to be exact) before I opened the box again and decided that I had the confidence to build it.  The dollhouse had what felt like a million pieces all which needed to be primed, sanded, painted, assembled, sanded again, and touched up.  The interior needed to be wallpapered and all the moldings needed to be put together.  The floor sanded, stained, sanded again, cleaned off for a top coat.  This was a real serious dollhouse.  It was just as much work as my real house (except I couldn't hire a contractor to do the work).


Here is timelapse video of all the work.  It isn't a tutorial, but it will give you an idea of how much work goes into building this house, if you ever decided you want to build one.

Finished dollhouse.  I picked colors like the Disney movie "Up" house.

Each shingle needed to be hand cut to get the angle on the roof!

The house isn't furnished yet.  The current furniture is too small a scale for the house.

Purple room for my Avery who loves purple.

I still need to wallpaper one last room with the crazy angles.  I'm saving that for another day.

I got the dollhouse is from ConsumerCrafts.com.