Tuesday, December 1, 2009

On my wish list ...

Not a dolls house, this time, but this wonderful book I discovered on the Puppenhausmuseum website:


This appears among the 1950s dolls houses, on a recently added page called Papier (Paper), which also has photos of 1950s furniture to make from cardboard. This book, published by Pestalozzi Verlag in 1958, shows a real dolls house (I'm not sure of the maker), peopled with Erna Meyer dolls!

The woman standing by the front door is almost identical to one currently in my Triang 52 house, though she has rather more hair:


The woman looking out of the window, and also dealing with an obstinate child later in the story:



must be Dianne Praeger's sister! And I'm sure some of my Erna Meyer children are just as obstinate.

I've seen a woman similar to the one standing outside the garage, ready to go out in her overcoat, listed on ebay once or twice. She's pretty rare, and goes for high prices.

The furniture and the dolls house itself are pretty cool too, but to have a whole book illustrated with Erna Meyer dolls! Wow! And one great thing about a book like this is that it dates all the dolls and furniture, probably to a year or two prior to publication. I suspect this book is much rarer than the people and furnishings within it, but maybe I'll get lucky some day, now I know to keep an eye out for it!

9 comments:

  1. wonderful! What a treat it would be to have a copy of this book!

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  2. What a lovely and interesting book, I can see why you want it, I hope you get it some day! The Erna Meyer dolls are exquisite and so fun for your dolls to have found their long lost relatives at last!

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  3. it looks so really cute and yes, the woman must be dianne praegers sister. best wishes for your search!!

    *nicola

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  4. Lovely looking book! I love a good challenge -- perhaps you are now energized to find your treasure?! It must also be great to solve some little mysteries, as it seems you have done!

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  5. Rebecca, how great to see some of your "peeps" in a wonderful old book! A great resource for rare and used books is Abebooks.com. They are linked to thousands of new/used book stores worldwide. I checked for this book and there are several listed but with a copyright date of 1988...probably not the same book, but all in Germany. (You might find another book you can't live without!). If your book is not listed now, it may be there in 2 weeks, so do keep checking. Thru Abebooks.com I have been able to find copies of the British murder mysteries that are no longer available in my local library ...one as far away in what was then Yugoslavia. Happy hunting!

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  6. Thank you all, especially Nicola, who has pointed me to a copy! Yes, the internet is wonderful for finding out of print books - I've used Abebooks, and Amazon UK, which lists many secondhand books from independent bookshops, as well as Australian online bookshops (not so useful for a book like this!). So it's definitely possible that one day I might have a copy of this lovely book - I'll let you know when I do!
    Florine - when I was little, our local library had a stack section upstairs, where all the older, less borrowed books were. My current library has no upstairs, no stack, and very low bookshelves, so not many books! And actually gives away books it no longer wants (at least some of them). If it's not popular enough to be borrowed, they don't have room for it! Sad, but thank goodness for secondhand bookshops, in real life and online :-)

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  7. Rebecca, You, Call Small, Shopping Sherpa etc are KILLING ME! This is a whole new dollhouse world for me! I love them and I'm IN California!!!! Surf's up!

    Just what I need a new addiction! Thank heavens for Oese who said she'd help.
    Show me more, Please, please, please! CM

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  8. I don't believe this is the same book at all, but it looks to be of a related type. http://cgi.ebay.de/Altes-Puppenbilderbuch-IM-PUPPENHAUS-Fotobilderbuch-rar_W0QQitemZ180442375236QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAntiquarische_B%C3%BCcher?hash=item2a03342444#ht_500wt_1182

    I hope you get your book for Christmas!

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  9. Thank you, Callsmall, well spotted! It has the same title, but the doll on the cover is certainly different. Looks like a good ebay.de category to keep an eye on, though!
    If not Christmas, there's always birthday time!

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