‘Dollhouse’ is a term used predominantly in the US and Canada whereas the British are familiar with the term ‘doll’s house’ or ‘dollshouse’. A doll house has always fascinated children as it is a toy home furnished with miniature household items. Even adults have found themselves captivated by the tiny architectural details of a doll house.
For a very long time now, adults and doll house collectors have been interested in collecting and designing doll houses, furnishing them with household wares, figures of inhabitants and toy pets. A doll house dates back many centuries and the oldest miniature houses have been found in Egyptian Tombs of the ‘Old Kingdom’, built about 4000 years ago.
Many antique doll houses are displayed in museums across the world. The ‘Queen Mary’s Doll’s House’ was exclusively built for Queen Mary and it was designed by the famous architect Sir Edwin Lutyens in 1924. This doll house is considered to be world famous and is one of the most well planned and intricately detailed doll houses in the world. This Lutyens doll house is still on display at the Windsor Castle and it displays, in great detail, the daily activities and household objects of those times.
The evolution of a doll house actually began around 400 years ago. Back then, they were known as ‘baby houses’ in Europe. Initially, these doll houses were built like cabinet display cases and consisted of rooms furnished with miniature household items. These were luxurious possessions for an adult and children were not allowed to play with a doll house as they were expensive. A fully furnished doll house was possibly worth the price of a real house, albeit a modest one. In those days, only the very wealthy patrons in Germany, England and Holland could afford to purchase a doll house for themselves. Then, every doll house was exclusively built by craftsmen specially commissioned for the purpose, unlike the mass produced factory fitted doll houses of today.
As time rolled by, more realistic and smaller doll houses were built in Europe and these were known as ‘Tate houses’. With the Industrial Revolution, doll houses and its miniature furnishings were produced on a mass scale by factories. However, it was only till as late as the early twentieth century that miniature homes began to be built to a uniform scale.
During the nineteenth century, many manufacturers produced a range of miniature toy furniture, but none of these followed a strict scale. During the early 20th century, most doll houses were made to ‘two third scale’ in which 1 foot is represented by 2/3 of an inch. Later, some doll houses were made to a scale of 1:18 in which one inch represents eighteen inches. ‘Play scale’ refers to 1:6 scale used for making doll houses and accessories for popular dolls such as Barbie and Blyth.
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