Tuesday, July 21, 2009

I am in love with a dollhouse!

Absolutely positively in love! And you guys are probably the only people I know that will understand. A friend of mine brought the Summer 2009 HBS catalog into work because she knows I love minis and I found my dream dollhouse - The Queen Anne II. It is magnificent! I've been trying to think of every excuse possible to justify spending $859.00! Including getting married, getting pregnant, giving birth to a daughter who would of course require a dollhouse of her own in a few years (which would give me time to build it), but David just won't go for it. Oh well, I guess I can dream - and save ;)
The catalog says The Queen Anne II is made by Real Good Toys and the following pictures are owned by their website and not by me. Their site is amazing though so check it out if you haven't already http://www.realgoodtoys.com/. The dimensions are 50"W x 49" H x 24"D so that means I am only about 16 inches taller than this house would be when fully built. I guess I really need to wait until I have a "real" house of my own before investing in something like this because once built this dollhouse would be so big that I wouldn't fit through my apartment door so I wouldn't be able to take it with me!
Then I saw this miniature English display hutch (once again the pic is owned by http://www.miniatures.com/hbs/global/index2.asp and not me) and that sparked the idea that this house would make a beautiful inn! Can't you just see little keys hanging for the rooms and little envelopes and parcels of mail sticking out of all of the little cubbys? I love it!
The inside shot of the house is what sparked my imagination the most. The catalog says this is a 13-room kit, but I only count 12 so I'm not sure exactly where the hidden room is. Any ideas?
So this is how I imagined it - you would come in the double doors and there would some sort of counter there and the display hutch would be behind it against the wall. The downstairs could be used as a little dining establishment that would be open to the town locals as well as the mini travelers who are staying the night at the inn. I think I would have to do a little bashing to the layout to make everything look the way it does in my head though. I think the downstairs room to the right should have a door leading out onto the beautiful porch so you could dine outside in the evenings. I'm not sure what all would be in the downstairs room to the left, but I know there would have to be a kitchen somewhere and maybe some sort of den area with some comfy chairs where guest could curl up with a pipe and a good book. The closed off rooms on the left-hand side of the second floor would be for the inn keeper and his family. The small room in the middle would be the shared bathroom for the inn guests. I would want one of those older toilets with the pull chain so I'm not sure what time period that would put the house in. The room to the right and the two rooms on the third floor would be bedrooms painted with warm colors and filled with big comfy beds with plenty of blankets and fluffy pillows. There would be wooden floors throughout and rich carpets and rugs scattered around. I wonder if there would be a way to take the outside door out of the second floor bedroom and put it in the hallway where the stairs are so that all the guests would have access to the balcony? And what exactly do you put on a balcony anyway? It seems like rocking chairs would go on the front porch, right?
I found this great gallery online of a finished Queen Anne that I wanted to share as well. For some reason if you click on any page other than the gallery it says the site is disabled so I really hope these pictures don't get taken down. http://jeaniesteenies.com/gallery/nw/The_Queen_Anne.html. The person who put this house together did an amazing job.
And by the way if anyone would like to donate to my dream I do have a paypal account...just kidding!!! Later guys!

3 comments:

Caseymini said...

Jessie, I am guessing that they are counting the tower room as seperate from the bedroom that it is in. They have to make the number of rooms as they can, count wise. More rooms, more dollars. LOL Anyway, if you count that way, it adds up to 13. I love that house and their Bostonian also. A friend of mine has that one and it takes up the whole end of her family room! Once built, they don't move. You are right!

Kim said...

I love your idea for this dollhouse!!! It would make the most perfect inn! How can you bear to not start saving for it now- I think I am going to be dreaming about dollhouse Inn's just from reading your idea! I'm off now to visit Jeanie's gallery :)

BALLET NEWS said...

Oh WOW, this is soooo beautiful ! You have the most gorgeous site here and I had to drop by and leave this comment for you - and say hello of course ! Your posts are lovely and you have interesting pictures. It's all perfect so thank you for sharing them all and best wishes....