# Building a Haunted Doll House



## chinclub (Oct 6, 2011)

I was never that into doll houses when I was a kid, but after seeing some of the haunted doll houses people are doing I changed my mind. I have seen many neat doll houses that were repainted and turned into haunted doll houses. That is a quick way to go, however, if I really want to get into decorating this thing I need to get the right scale and do it correctly the first time. I knew I wanted 1:12 scale. This means one inch in doll land is equal to one foot in the real world. This is the scale most collectable doll furniture will be in. Once I started looking for that scale of doll house I realized they were really big bucks. No problem, I will just make my own.

This is the journey of building my dream haunted doll house:



I started by looking at pictures of spooky old houses and found a design I liked. Then I went looking for the largest cardboard boxes I could find. I drew a rough sketch of what I wanted. Must have front porch, must have creepy attic, must have 9 ft ceilings and large rooms like an old manor house.
Once I had my design I just cut up my boxes and put it together with tape.


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Now comes the paper mache. I covered everything with paper mache; the walls, floors, ceilings, windows. It is important to pay close attention to all joining pieces of cardboard. I would hate for it to fall apart later. I was also careful to cover every edge; the walls, floors, windows. This will make for much cleaner lines and a more finished out look. 

It took 10 hours to get the first coat finished. Happily it was a third of that to do the second coat.

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You will notice the walls and floors are not perfectly square. I'd love to say it was by design, but truth is that it just sagged a little while drying. It totally works, though, because I am building an old, dilapidated, haunted house. The imperfections give it character and realism. 

The second coat seemed strong enough for me. It will get more reinforcement when I attach the siding on the outside and the wall paper and flooring on the inside.

I hope you will check back and watch my progress on this build.


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