Dolls house history

The fascinating hobby of making houses and all of their contents in miniature form is not a recent one. It has been in existence for centuries in one form or another. The earliest recorded replica of a fully furnished house was owned by Albert V, Duke of Bavaria, in the mid-sixteenth century. It was a copy of his own residence and became known as his ‘baby house’. Following his example, many other wealthy people began to commission fine miniature pieces – both doll houses and their contents – to be made by expert craftsmen using all manner of different materials. These were not made for use as children’s playthings but were solely a display of taste, wealth and social standing.

This fashion continued throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and gradually the joy of miniatures began to be shared by the children of these wealthy households. Initially they were not so much toys as aids to education in life and household management. By the 1800′s the dolls house was finally viewed as a toy and something that children could play with although it was still limited to the households of the wealthy.

The arrival of the Victorian age saw the beginning of mass production. From then on the doll house was truly a toy and it was for this market that the miniature pieces were produced in quantity. The major force of manufacture was Germany, from where doll house items were exported all over the world.

However there were two notable adult exceptions to this new trend. The first was Queen Mary, the wife of King George V of England, who had a strong interest in dolls houses. In the early 1920′s one of the foremost architects of the day, Sir Edwin Lutyens was commissioned to build a doll house for the Queen’s personal pleasure. A model house was designed in the precise scale of one inch to one foot and again, as in the preceding centuries, fine craftsmen of the day were involved in the production of all different types of miniature items.

At about the same time in America, Mrs James W. Thorne, a socialite from Chicago, was collecting miniatures from all over the world. She developed the idea of displaying these treasures in sets of boxes which were furnished in a range of different styles and periods. By 1940 Mrs Thorne had put together over forty individual room settings showing both European and American interior designs and decoration. All of these rooms were completed in exact one inch to the foot scale.

Since then the manufacture of toy miniatures for children’s dolls houses has continued and, although antique doll houses have long been collected by the enthusiasts it was not until the 1970′s that adults again started to collect contemporary pieces and display them in houses or room boxes.

Today the hobby of miniatures and miniature collecting is enjoying huge popularity and there are a growing number of specialist shops, miniatures fairs and doll house publications to cater for this interest. Miniature enthusiasts like to recreate past eras or present events in either whole houses or specific scenes. Some enjoy making the models themselves, while others collect craftsman-made pieces or commission them to be made to their particular requirements. The aim in all this is to achieve accurate detail to capture the right mood, character and style and to add personal touches to the work, raising the hobby to an art form of creative expression.

Bratz & Barbie Doll Stand-ins portray “The Scintillate Seed to Vela Kurv” in “Bleeding Love” by Leona Lewis

Nightmare Before Christmas Jack Skellington Sculpted Stackable Mugs $39.95 stackable mugs…

Boston Warehouse Dollhouse Peeler $9.99 59201 Features: -Vegetable peeler.-Durable plastic and stainless steel. Dimensions: -Overall dimensions: 7.5” H x 1.25” W x 1.25” D. Collection: -Dollhouse collection….

Wilton Wonder Mold Doll Pan $20.99 The perfect base for a doll cake using Teen Doll pick included. Great for basket designs, hills and much more. Pan is 8in. Diameter and 5in. Deep; takes 5-6 cups of firm-textured batter. Heat-conducting rod assures even baking. Kit contains pan, rod, sta…

Bathroom Wall $18.98 A mixture of so-so standup routines and comedy-music hybrids a la Adam Sandler, Saturday Night Live’s Jimmy Fallon provides just enough laughs on The Bathroom Wall to satisfy one’s funny bone–for the first listen or two, anyway. Unfortunately, with the exception of his masterful impressions (a hilarious Bono among them) and the amusing Prince takeoff “Idiot Boyfriend,” Fallon’s shtick gets old pr…

Best of Pooh & Friends & Heffalumps Too $7.68 The soundtrack to 2003′s Piglet’s Big Movie, from which Heffalumps borrows a couple of songs, played like a well-kept secret: Instead of stuttering along with Tigger and the gang, grown-ups got to match vocals with Carly Simon, who lent the bulk of the songs baby-blanket warmth and appeal. On this sequel soundtrack for which she was wisely recruited, she appears as honey-voiced as ever, coaxing a …

Rock Angelz $6.70 All products are BRAND NEW and factory sealed. Fast shipping and 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed….

A baby makes love stronger, nights longer, days shorter, bankroll smaller, home happier, and a future worth living Wall Art Vinyl Lettering Decal Sticker NURSERY $14.99 Qty: 1 Wall Art Vinyl Decal Size: 22.5 inches in length x 10 inches in height COLOR: BLACK Image is not of actual scale. Please view the size above for actual size. Please be sure to make certain you purchase a QUALITY VINYL WALL ART DECAL. We Only use TOP QUALITY VINYL that lasts for years. Others are selling lower priced wall art by using lower quality vinyl that will fall off after a few days o…

Laurel & Hardy: The Essential Collection $50.49 Pardon Us (1931), Laurel and Hardy’s first feature-length film, finds the duo causing chaos behind bars after selling bootleg beer to a cop. Ex-soldiers Stan and Ollie try to reunite a war buddy’s orphaned daughter with her grandfather in “Pack Up Your Troubles” (1932). The boys are lodge members who sneak off to a convention–minus their wives–in “Sons of the Desert” (1933). Based on an opera, “…

Jeff Dunham: Spark of Insanity $3.71 Ventriloquist Jeff Dunham’s second live-performance DVD, Spark of Insanity, is much funnier than his first, Arguing With Myself, perhaps because his new puppets allow him to cover more controversial territory beyond skits about family beefs and office humor. Though some puppets reappear, like the beloved Peanut, a purple monkey who loves wordplay, new characters emerge as the stars of this hour-lo…

Jeff Dunham – Arguing With Myself $4.81 Arguing With Myself, a recorded live performance of ventriloquist Jeff Dunham, portrays a comedian whose revival of an old-fashioned art has made ventriloquism more relevant to modern societal concerns. Starring his six main characters, from Bubba Jay, a Nascar-obsessed hick, to Peanut, a flamboyant gay monkey, Dunham’s puppets have dirty but relatively inoffensive senses of humor that mock the Am…