The reward for the 70+ tedious hours to build my 1955 Betsy McCall dollhouse? Now it’s time for the fun part — decorating the interior — starting with the walls. At first, I simply planned to use leftover paint, but Pam sent me a care package and as soon as it arrived — I was hook line and sinkered on wallpaper!
I don’t use much — if any — pattern in my decor, so at first I wasn’t sure my dollhouse needed wallpaper, but then I opened the box from Pam and got excited. Pam is the world’s #1 fan of wallpaper. She has quite a hoard of vintage wallpaper in her basement, which she has collected a roll at a time from estate sales and from a nearby store that used to deal in wallpaper from the 1950s until about 2000 and still had a lot in its basement. For my dollhouse project, she went through the stash and looked for papers with very small patterns.
Vintage wallpaper is just so pretty, and I do love it in small doses, and this is a small house, so why not take a nibble at that apple? Oh oh. Ya can’t eat just one, and before I knew it, there was a wallpaper explosion — among other its and bits I had gathered for the project — and I was planning to install it in every room of the house.
Pam and I discussed my somewhat surprising wallpaper-it-all decision and decided that this dollhouse is akin to an assemblage/collage type project, where adding extra layers — like patterned wallpaper — only makes the end result more interesting. I agree, and personally, the patterns are so much easier for me to take on a small scale — in fact, I am loving all of the wallpaper in the dollhouse. I think it does so much to liven up the small spaces and — once furniture and decor are added — will really add to the “wow” factor.
Since I only had limited amounts of patterned papers, I was very careful to ensure that no mistakes were made while “hanging” the wallpaper. I made patterns out of plain white paper taped together and made sure to mark each to show which way was up and which side was the front.
Then I laid out the paper patterns on the wallpaper, traced them and carefully cut them out.
The dollhouse’s living loom wallpaper
After a quick, last minute test fit, I used ModPodge to adhere the paper to the walls. The main living room got this lovely gold, beige and white vintage small scale wallpaper pattern — my favorite of the bunch that Pam sent.
My dollhouse’s living room room wallpaper is actually a pattern designed to coordinate with the leafy vintage wallpaper Pam used in her master bathroom in 2013 (above). Pam purchased the rolls at an estate sale.
The dollhouse’s guest bedroom walllpaper
Since the smaller bedroom had a shared wall with the living room, I continued the paper all the way into the bedroom for a seamless look. Next, to mix it up a bit, I used some grasscloth wallpaper — the same stuff Pam has in her living room and dining room — for the bedroom’s other two walls.
Hey, look — the bedroom has a wallpaper accent wall!
Wallpaper for the dollhouse bathroom
For the bathroom, I chose another small scale, linear patterned paper from Pam’s box. You’ll notice that I didn’t wallpaper all the way down to the floor — that’s because there will be tile covering up the bottom of the walls soon.
I chose to paint the trim in the bathroom white to coordinate with the paper and other elements that will eventually be added to the space.
I just love this pattern, don’t you?
Wrapping paper “wallpaper” for the master bedroom
The only room that didn’t get vintage wallpaper in was the master bedroom. I really wanted at least one of the rooms in the house to have a bright, flower power feel. This paper is a decorative paper I bought a few years ago at a card and paper shop because I just loved the bold, saturated oranges and pinks and the fun pattern. And yes, those are metallic gold flowers mixed in!
While I was gearing up for the dollhouse project, I ran across the paper and decided it would be perfect for the dollhouse. I love it and I think the scale is perfect to mimic late 60s to early 70s large scale, graphic metallic wallpaper patterns.
Still in the works: Wallpaper for the kitchen and dining room
With four of the five rooms wallpapered, all that remained is the large, open kitchen and dining room area of the house. I already knew I wanted the kitchen color scheme to be white, red, and yellow, but the only paper I had with a color scheme that would work in the space is a small sheet — (not from Pam’s stash, she sent me larger pieces) — that will certainly not cover the room’s large walls.
I was going to try and work with this remnant… but Pam encouraged me to reach out to one of our longtime advertisers, Hannah’s Treasures, and see if they had any small-scale, red or yellow prints that might work. Heck yeah! They are looking through their shelves right now to see what they can find for me to consider. Hurray — another box o’ vintage wallpaper samples will land on my doorstep soon. What Treasures will be inside!?
It is amazing how much the wallpaper brightened up the interior of the dollhouse already? Next up: I am going to start with some tiling and flooring while I greedily wait for the vintage wallpaper googies to come.
Michael Coyle says
Ha! For a second I thought your bathroom picture was the dollhouse bathroom! I though, damn, that looks goooood!
My wife is pregnant and this article is making me hope it’s a girl so I can build her this.
Mary Elizabeth says
Michael, no need to wait for a girl to build a doll house. Boys like miniature things, too. We had a cool doll house when our kids were small, very plain, with the furnished living area on the top floor and a big empty space on the bottom. When my nephew played with it, he brought over firetrucks and firemen, who slept in the beds and made firehouse chili or something in the kitchen, then periodically went to fires. My niece used it as a stable for her horse collection, with the riders and grooms sleeping upstairs. My daughter used it sometimes as a beauty salon and sometimes a natural history museum, with tiny shells and rocks displayed with plastic dinosaurs. It was for a time a garage with many toy cars in for service. Don’t be too fussy about gender specific toys. My daughter (now an electrical engineer) was fascinated with construction and wore a hard hat every day for two years. And her young sons (6 and 3) play with dolls.
Oh, and if you are very secure in your masculinity, you could build it just for yourself. 🙂
Kate says
My little brother used to play with me and my dollhouse — he was the mailman with his trucks. As I recall, my dolls got a lot of mail and packages! 🙂
Mary Elizabeth says
Did the mail truck pick up packages from a mail car in the train set? 🙂
Kate says
Oh definitely the mail truck/car. My brother is now an automotive engineer… 🙂
JKM says
I thought the same thing! Boy, that bathroom is SO realistic-looking! Oh, wait…
Mary Elizabeth says
My favorite papers that you chose are the living room and the bathroom papers. That pink, gray, black and white bathroom paper would go perfectly in my bathroom IF the gray plastic tile with pink liners didn’t go all the way up the walls and across the ceiling. There’s not one spot for wallpaper, unless I wanted to wallpaper the back of the door. Luckily, they didn’t tile over the window. 🙂
Mary Elizabeth says
By the way, when I was a little girl, I had the same idea you did about cutting patterns from plain white paper before cutting into my dollhouse wallpaper. I got the paper from old wallpaper sample books that one of my aunts rescued from the trash. Most of those were too large in scale, but some worked fine. I did one room with a scrap of quilting fabric. Cloth glued on the walls was also a wall treatment in that time period.
Roundhouse Sarah says
Maybe the kitchen is the one room you could paint? I’m thinking if you put a patterned flooring and have the cabinets up a print on the wall may be too much for this tiny house? Unless you find the perfect wallpaper then just go with your gut.
Also I was thinking you def have to find mini Easter eggs to make a mini bullet planter for the plant diy Linda is sending you.
Kate says
Great minds think alike Sarah! I was thinking about trying to locate a mini easter egg to make a bullet planter out of. I don’t have any laying around, but I bet if I’m patient, there will be easter candy in the stores the day after valentine’s day. 🙂
lisa in Seattle says
I was contemplating my son’s hackysack this weekend and realized one of those would make a great pouf or beanbag chair for your house. I also remembered that I used to use plastic drink stirrers for curtain rods in my dollhouse.
Diane in CO says
Wonderful! Methinks you need some shag carpeting somewhere. Is there a material that could be the correct scale?
Kate says
Maybe some of that “fake fur” fabric stuff that people use to make stuffed animals?
Mary Elizabeth says
I think fake fur would be perfect, Kate. Look on the remnants table in the fabric store. Or do you have a craft friend who does lots of stuffed animals and might have scraps?
Kate says
I have a trip to look at fabric remnants planned Mary E. No friends that sew who might have scraps of fake fur.
Lynne says
Try looking at velvets and velveteens for carpet. Velour works as well. For lino looking floors, keep in mind papers (scrapbook or wrapping). Give it a couple good coats of Mod Podge and you’re set. Once coated and dry, you can cut it into the appropriate size squares or designs and glue it down piece by piece.
If you do decide you want a plain painted wall. Give the primed wall a nice coat of gesso. It gives a plaster looking effect. Then paint the gesso the color of choice.
Cocoa says
You can also use Sculpey or any polymer clay for lino floors. Run it through a polymer clay only designated pasta machine or clay only rolling pin. You can make those fabulous custom inlaid lino floors that we all drool over! Make sure you bake it to package instructions (don’t forget to prehet) and don’t use anything you used for food again, this includes the pan you bake it in. Also, if clay is not cured (baked) it can eat through or adhere itself to things like plastic, etc. Other than those safety issues, it’s pretty cool stuff to work with, especially for miniatures. It makes great fake food and flowers too!
pam kueber says
haha guess who likely has some in her… hoard
Kate says
Hahahahaha YOU! Sometimes I forget that YOU sew! I should have known… 🙂
Robin, NV says
Wow Kate, this looks fabulous. Awesome choices on the wallpaper. By the way, I spotted this book on Amazon the other day. Check out the flooring in the upper left of the cover. Perfect for your bathroom (if the scale looks right). http://www.amazon.com/Use-Now-Dollhouse-Floor-Paper/dp/148193693X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1422283128&sr=8-2&keywords=book+of+dollhouse+floors
Speaking of scale – I’m curious to see what retro designs you’re able to find for furniture. Or are you planning on making it yourself?
Kate says
Very neat paper book Robin, I had no idea things like that existed.
I have found quite a bit of 1:12 scale furniture to use in the house, however my $100 budget dictates that I will also be making some of it myself. Stay tuned!!!
linda says
I built dollhouses in the 80’s and 90’s(and I have a great MCM I hope to get built this year), and another good source for paper and accessories is the scrapbook department. There are all kinds of papers and embellishments available.
Jenny A. says
It’s looking good, Kate! I must admit I saw that picture of Pam’s master bathroom and thought it was an interior shot of the doll house at first. I was thinking “man, it looks so real”, ha ha!
Kate says
I might be good Jenny A, but I’m not THAT good! hehehehe
Rachel Hobson says
Ha! I thought the same thing! 🙂
LOVE the wallpaper. So fun to see the house coming along!
linda h says
Aw, I really like that wallpaper you already have in the kitchen, but I’m sure you will receive some more great paper. I would have used the paper to do the accent wall in the dining area and painted or subway tiled the rest, but I know you had decided to paper the whole house. I hope that half wall by the stairs becomes a built-in planter like the entryway one at your house.
Lynne says
Just a hint from my old doll house days in the 1980’s…..Florist tape, doubled, sticky sides together makes very realistic looking greenery. You can sandwich a thin wire in between if you need to really shape it. It’s so easy to cut into any shape you would like. You can use markers or paint speckles or lines.
pam kueber says
Great tip!
Lynne says
I can tell ya how to make flowers, too!
Penne says
I have an instruction booklet for miniature house plants made from florist tape with photos for ideas. Would Kate like to take a look at it?
Kate says
Cool Lynne! Thanks for the tip!
Steve H says
Looks beautiful! The papers are all so well scaled. That bathroom paper would go perfectly with pink tile.