Chateau d'Orcy

After I finished the breakfast room it's time to move to the hallway. I like large and impressive hallways, they are the reflection of the house. So I had big plans with the hallway! First I wanted another frontdoor. I never liked the door of the original Beacon Hill and I think it's odd that it is not in the middle of the wall when you look from the front side. However if you look inside it is logical because of the stairs. So I had to remove the stairs too. Which I didn't mind, because I don't like them either.  I decided to made one big room instead of the hallway and the little (kitchen)room next to it. I cut out the shape of an arch to connect both rooms. The smaller room will be the stairwell. I also covered the windows on the left side, because the stairs will be against that wall. On the outside I will also remove the windows and there will be a gazebo next to it.  For the walls I used the same method as used in the breakfast room. I removed the wallpaper with w...

 For almost a year I have been in love with my Beacon Hill, but yet I always dreamed of the big dollhouses with numerous and spacious rooms. The Beacon Hill has a fairly large number of rooms. But since I want them to be spacious I'm planning on removing some walls. So it happened now and then that I was doubting if it wouldn't be better to start again with a bigger dollhouse. In the mean time I finished the breakfast room and I couldn't find a bigger dollhouse that I would like more. So I decided to expand my Beacon Hill.  I had been searching for people who also had expand there Beacon Hill. I hoped to find some inspiration how I could do it the best way. But I couldn't find anything like what I had in mind. So my first thought was that I would build an expansion from scratch. After I give it some thought, I realised it would be very difficult to make something that would blend in perfectly with the house I already had. I wanted the same windows, roof... So I decided ...

For the outside (and inside) I'm going for a French look. What bothered me the most was de siding of the original dollhouse. It doesn't look French at all. So I tried to find a way to remove it. The easiest way seemed to cover the walls with clay. I used Darwi clay classic. I placed it in a very thin layer and then pushed it with a flat surface, so it would be as flat as possible. When it was dry I sanded the wall and filled the cracks with spackle. It took me around 3 days for one wall. I also replaced the original front door with a bigger and more elegant one and placed it in the middle of the wall. Some time ago I already removed the porch. Instead I will create a small balcony on the first floor.  On Etsy I bought some decorations for the windows. I put them in place temporally with some tape, but it gives an idea how the final result will look. 

After several months, my breakfast room is almost ready! It still need some curtains and details, but I'm quite happy with how it looks already. I first wanted to turn it into a dining room, but it quickly didn't feel like a dining room to me. I love breakfast, so the idea of a breakfast room seemed fun. Now it's (almost) finished I think it's the perfect room for having breakfast! I can imagine sitting there, with the morning sun shining throught the big windows...  Breakfast on a summer morning  Breakfast on a winter morning  I first removed the old walpaper with water. Some glue remained on the walls, so I had do sand them. After I've done that, I put the electricity in place and covered the walls with non-woven wallpaper.  Once the walls were covered I could really start. The first thing I did was making the floor. I love herringbone parquet in old mansions, so it was quicly decided. I used long wooden slats and cut them all the same size. The slats had all a sl...

 Last spring, I started working on my (first) dollhouse. After some research on the internet, I was convinced I wanted a Beacon Hill from Greenleaf. I love Pinterest and what beautiful inspiration I saw there! At that point, the idea was to build the dollhouse as originally. Just build it, choose a nice colour and done.  The first problem was to buy a Beacon Hill. I live in Belgium and it is almost impossible to find a Beacon Hill here. They are usually not shipped because of the size of the package, even on the official site unfortunately it didn't work out. I was so lucky to find the dollhouse in my neighbourhood through a second-hand site. It was already built, painted and furnished. So instead of a construction project, it became a renovation project.                                                ...