4 Responses

1. evie c

   23|Oct|2009 1

   I have asked an expert.
   You should draw plans, first.
   You would have the following equipment, in an ideal World, but feel free to improvize, if there’s someting you can’t lay your hands on.
   1. A flat, smooth surface, on which to draw. A bit of plywood would be good.
   2. Some heavy-duty tracing paper.
   3. Some sharp pencils (or, better still, a clutch pencil and a little sharpener for it).
   4. An eraser or a razor blade. [A razor blade can be used like an eraser on very tough tracing paper. Scratch gently in one direction, with the blade at 90 degrees to the paper.]
   5. Some “Magic” tape. Masking tape is a second-rate alternative. Use the tape to fix your drawing to the falt surface, on which you’re leaning.
   6. A large set square, with a millimetre scale if possible. It’s impossible to line up walls properly, simply by measuring down each side, with a ruler, and then trying to draw a line across. It never works.
   7. A ruler (300 mm or longer) with the appropriate scale.
   8. A very fine (0.3 mm or less) pen, for going over the pencil lines, once you’ve completed your design.
   9. A pair of compasses.
   1:10 would probably be the easiest scale to work with but the dolls will have to be of a corresponding size. Using the 1:10 scale, a doll, which is 18.3 cm tall would be the equivalent of a real person, who is 6 ft (1m 83 cm) tall.
   If your prototype [i.e. a "real" house, on which your design is based] has a garden, which is 10 metres wide, then your model will have one, which is 1 metre wide.
   First of all, prepare your scale ground-floor plan, using the set square to mark out the corners and the longer ruler to measure larger distances, for which the set square isn’t long enough. Start with the exterior walls and doors and then put in the interior ones.
   A door is shown by a semi-circle, with the hinges of the door being the centre of the circle. Then draw the door, as a radius of the circle, at 45 degrees to the wall, into which the door is set.
   Walls and doors should be shown on your plan at the thickness of the material [balsa wood or cardboard?], which you’re going to use for construction. That means you’ll show both doors and walls by means of two, parallel lines. In “plan view” [i.e. looking from directly above], just mark the edges of your window gaps as short lines, at 90 degrees to the walls.
   Next, you need to prepare a first-floor plan. Your could photocopy your gound floor drawing and change it to suit.
   Once you have all (or both of) the floor plans [I don't know whether you're gong to have an attic. It would be easier, if you didn't.], you need to make the elevation drawings [In other words, the walls, as seen from outside.], still using the same techniques.
   If you’re really confident and have a clear idea of what you’re doing, you could draw directly on to the wood or card but it’s safer to use paper and then transfer the design to your structural materials.
   The easiest thing to do, when it comes to the roof, is have a bog-standard, pitched roof, with gable walls at each side of the house. That means you can make the roof out of two flat, rectangular pieces of balsa (or cardboard) The roof should overlap the gables a little bit. You can either leave projecting tabs at the tops of the exterior walls, so that tese can be slotted into holes you cut in the roof OR you can fix a “cornice” at the top of the FRONT and BACK exterior walls, to hold the roof in place.
   Carpet tape or pipe repair tape could be used to join the roof at the ridge and even seal it at the edges. Once it’s painted (and provided it has been used neatly and properly fixed to the boards), it will not be noticeable. It’s the equivalent of lead flashing on a real roof. The alternative for the ridge of the roof is a long, narrow strip of card, scored along the middle and folded in half. It would then be glued to the two halves of the roof.
   Windows can have plastic “glass”. The hard, thin stuff you get in packaging is good. Just glue it on, from the inside.
   Access is important. You’ll have to leave a huge, gaping hole, somewhere in one of the walls, so that the dollies, who “live” there can get in and out. The easiest option is a big gap in the back wall, with a semi-circular top. Make sure thst the top of this “arch” is an inch or more below the roof [Use the compasses or a big biscuit tin to draw the circle.]
   The best way to join all the pieces together is to leave a little bit extra at the edges to be joined and then cut slots in the balsa or card. Let’s say you’re joining one exterior wall to another, which runs at 90 degrees to it. On the first wall, cut a slot, about as wide as your material is thick, from the bottom to about halfway up. On the second wall, cut a similar slot, from the top to about halfway down. The two will slide together and, when you set them on a base, they should stand upright.
   Once all four exterior walls (and the internal walls) have been joined, you will have a strong, boxy structure. That’s basically how brick houses were built, up until the 1970s.
   You could make a feature out of the protruding walls, and glue other strips of wood, the same thickness, at intervals, to create a half-timbered effect, like and “Olde Englande” cottage.
   You could then paint the house white and paint the bits that stick out black. You can add bits of wood, to form diagonals and window sills etc, between the vertical “timbers”. I would suggest painting the roof brown, orange or red and creating a tiled effect on it. You can buy paper, with tile or brick patterns already on it but it’s quite easy to rule out the pattern yourself, with a pencil. Paint the roof in one colour and then add “tiles” in very slightly different shades, by mixing a tiny amount of black or white into the first colour and painting it on top of the (already dry) base coat(s). Use vinyl emulsion paint, which comes in lots of different sized tins, including small “testers”. Once finished, cover the whole house in two coats of quick-drying, water-based varnish. It’s really a kind of glaze that has to be put on quite lightly. The one that “does exactly what it says on he tin” is good but a little more expensive than a “store’s own brand”.
   Remember to place the windows, so that they don’t interfere with the structure of your building. The base should have slots rebated into it for the walls. On the other hand, it would be easier to glue strips of wood to the base, on each side of the exterior walls, in order to hold them in place.

2. Super Dog

   23|Oct|2009 2

   well, measure your own house and then divide every measurement by the same number to bring it down to doll size.

3. sylveste

   23|Oct|2009 3

   home made doll houses are wonderful gifts, my father made two but he styled the dimensions after the barbie town house in those days, letting the kids put their own carpet, curtains and furniture, the only wooden houses on the block

4. wont_coo

   23|Oct|2009 4

   most houses are done in different scales…you would be far better buying a proper drawn up plan for it….have a look here.http://www.dijon.co.uk/shop/browse.html?…
   or if you click on the details for each house….it does give the measurements