June

June for me was busy with the Dolls Houses Past and Present online magazine. As well as editing and uploading other members' contributions, I wrote two articles myself. One article is about Kaybot Novelties and Kay Miniature, who made yummy plaster food:

 

and other things like fireplaces:

My other article is about the dolls houses made by the Lord Roberts Memorial Workshops in London, during and just after World War I. They were set up to provide employment for soldiers and sailors who had lost hands or limbs in the war.

A while ago, I came across the catalogue from 1916/17. It's full of the toys made in the workshops - lots of battle toys, as well as dolls houses, farms, villages and shops:

A butcher's shop

A houseboat dolls house

I had read about one Lord Roberts' dolls house in the International Dolls House News, but I've never seen one anywhere else. Their toys would have their logo on them:

If you know of any, I'd love to hear about them!


Some Blogger ps and qs:

If anyone knows if it's still possible to place two photos in a row in this new blogger set-up, please let me know how! It used to be possible not to select either left, right or centre for the alignment of photos, and you could just add them across the page like text - and resize them by dragging the corner, not just by choosing a preset Small, Medium, Large or X-Large. I think we have been left with fewer options now.

I know that Google Reader is about to finish. My understanding is that the Blogger Dashboard and Google Friend Connect will continue, for the time being at least, so we can still follow each other as we have done, and see the most recent blog posts in the dashboard and on the side of our blogs. So I haven't set up an alternative like Bloglovin. However, I have saved a list of all the blogs I follow, so if I'm wrong and my dashboard reading list disappears, I can find you all and follow you again!

Lines Letchworth Doll's House 1912-1914

This is the third house from my grandmother - my sister's house, which my grandmother called 'Roseville' after the place we lived when my sister was a baby. I sent photographs of this house to Marion Osborne in 2002, along with the photos of my Lines house (No. 17). Marion Osborne identified this one as the Letchworth doll's house, which appeared in Harrods catalogues in 1912 and 1914. It does not appear in her reference book Lines and Tri-ang Dollshouses and Furniture 1900-1971, as she did not then have the information.


I'm sorry that this photo is a bit washed out - I took it some time ago. However, it does show the front pretty clearly. The house is a bit of a mystery - in the catalogue, it is described and shown as having an open front, and a related house, the "Garden City", is shown with open sides as well as an open front. Marion Osborne thought it was possible that Lines had changed the design, but not the artwork, to include sides and a front - she noted that the balustrades and pediments were correct (except the flat balustrades downstairs).
The house has definitely been repainted. When my grandmother acquired this house, in the 1960s, not much was known of dolls' house makers. I do remember my grandmother remarking on the blue mansard roof, and the house may have been thought to be a French 'Blue Roof' house (since identified as actually made by the German company Gottschalk). The original roofing would most likely have been tiled paper.
Several of the original green window blinds have survived.

This is the left side of the dolls' house, with the front door.


Inside are two small rooms, decorated by my grandmother as a kitchen and children's room. All rooms have the original Lines fireplaces (though I'm not sure that the paint colours are all original).



In the kitchen, the kitchenmaid Bessie is at work. Bessie and the parlour-maid Darlow are cloth dolls which were given to my sister when she was small, and are most likely modern (1960s).



The large central rooms are furnished as a dining room, where another maid is cleaning out the fireplace:


and drawing room, where Darlow has just shown in a visitor.



The rooms have been repapered. As Marion Osborne pointed out, the red and gold paper in the dining room appears in a 1952 Hobbies catalogue, along with the parquet floor paper (surprisingly described as 'Lino Floor Paper'). A tiny bit of the original floor paper can be seen in the doorway between the drawing room and the children's room. I don't have a good picture of it - I think of it as oakleaf patterned tiles.

On the far side is the staircase, with doors leading into the two large central rooms. I think the paint, including the lines, on the staircase may be original; on some of the internal doors, faint lines are visible under the paint, suggesting that they may originally have been decorated like the staircase, and repainted at some time.


Thank you very much Marion for identifying this dolls' house!