The Fairfield: Wallpapering III

27/12: I started wallpapering the lounge room with the red damask paper, and I got the three main walls done without too much difficulty.

I also wallpapered one wall of the bedroom today; the French door wall.

I then glued together the bay window so that I can wallpaper it next, and do the window trim before I glue it to the main house.

I also took the plugs off the chandelier in the foyer and fitted it, as well as one of the single wall-mounted lights in the hallway. The chandelier has a different, larger, fitting than the hall light, and when I checked, only the smaller fitting will go into the 1:24 scale electrical fitting I have. I have a few spare plugs, so I hope I can change it over.

28/12: Today I wallpapered the bay window and then glued the window trim on the inside of the window. It needs some wood filler as one of the corners didn't meet up exactly, but I'm not sure what to do there since it is stained. Maybe fill, sand and paint the filler black?  It is the top right corner, so you can it from the outside, but it isn't overly bad.

I then wallpapered the second wall in the bedroom - the fireplace wall. I can't do the back wall until I am sure that the hall light works, as I will be papering over the wire. Unfortunately, the bi-pin bulb for the light is TINY and I am having trouble getting it into the fitting without throwing a wobbly, lol. So that's on hold for the moment.

I also printed and trimmed the picture of a map of Middle Earth from The Hobbit for the study wall. I had to trim it down more than I would have liked to fit the space, but I think it will look OK. I now need to decide which wallpaper will go best with it for the other two walls - I don't want anything which will compete with the map for attention.

Ordered: (Minimum World) Exterior corner moulding, shrink tubes for electrical work, a second hanging bulb light for the attic, and tan wallpaper for study.

The Fairfield: Lighting & The Secret Room

I decided it was time to put some more thought into the lighting since I need to put in the channels for the wiring before I do any more wallpapering or flooring. I drilled holes for the lights in the foyer, lounge room, work room and the hallway lights, and started making channels in the floors and walls to feed the wiring into the hollow chimney. It's not very easy I must say - I need to find the small, pointy-ended file I have misplaced, as I think it will do a better job than the Stanley knife I have been using.

Being Christmas Eve, and having almost everything organised (yay me!), I had time to send a lot of the day pottering away on little things for the house.  I wallpapered two of the secret tower room walls - I used this paper, which I think looks suitably old and grubby:

I did some painting too. I undercoated a few pieces and the new front door and round windows, painted the ceilings in the foyer and kitchen - which I totally forgot to do before I glued in the first floor - and the back of the stairs (which I also should have done before I glued it in; live and learn).

I also punched out the pieces for the bay windows ready for prep work, and then I started playing around with the roof around the library area - before the attic floor goes in, I need to decide if and how much of the floor I will cut out to create the double height space.  I was going to add a lot of details to the ceiling, in terms of exposed beams etc, but I forgot that there is a section of roof on the back side too, which will obscure a lot of that work. Hmn.

The Fairfield: Foyer Floor Feature

I want to get the floor feature in the foyer done before the tower walls go up, so that it is easy to dry fit and play with it to get the fit right.  I looked at various parquetry patterns and tiles, but decided in the end that I really liked the anti-possession symbol from the TV show Supernatural.

I started by trimming a piece of balsa wood to shape (actually, the piece I had was slightly too narrow, so I has to cut a little extra piece for the back wall, but I hope it won't be too noticeable once it is finished.

I then used a compass to score the circles in the pattern, and then drew the sun and pentagram freehand.  The symbol in the show is made from brass, set into a dark timber floor. To try and replicate this, I scored board marks into the balsa wood, and coloured the symbol in with a gold marker.

Initial symbol

I tried it in place. The piece of balsa wood wasn't wide enough to extend through the doorway, but I think I will place a piece of faux tile here, with more symbols on it, similar to the tiles between the doorways in the Men of Letters bunker on the show.

I then applied the first coat of Walnut stain.  The gold marker was dulled down to a reasonable-looking brass colour which I was happy with.  I did however want the floor to be a darker colour through using black paint washes, so I added another layer of gold marker to the symbol and let it dry before applying the first wash.

After coat of Walnut stain

The colour wasn't deep enough and I didn't think that a black wenge wash would make it dark enough, so I just painted the wenge stain straight over the top and rubbed it off gently after a minute. I love the final colour, it has a nice glow.  I redid the gold marker over the top and then sealed it with Mod Podge.

In real life the gold feature is a more subdued bronze, which is what I wanted. It turned out quite well I think.

Finished floor

The Fairfield: Construction Step 7, More Walls Glued In

Today I glued in kitchen window wall and the remainder of the first floor floor.  It's actually starting to look like a house now.

Stairs, kitchen walls and the rest of the first floor glued in place

Whilst it was all strapped and clamped and drying, I sanded out the first floor doorways and fitted the bedroom and study doors.  They fit perfectly before I glued the other pieces in, but needed a little squaring afterwards. I am pleased with how they look against the wallpaper.

Bedroom door fitted in place

The next step is to work on the tower walls.

A couple of months ago I ordered a new front door, and two round porthole windows for the tower room.  Today I cut out the doorway to fit the new door (it's taller than the old door), and I also cut the spaces for the new round tower room windows. I think they are going to look good - you should certainly have no trouble seeing the Weeping Angel in the secret tower room :-)



Next: I need to sort out the foyer flooring and wallpaper the tower walls - foyer and first floor anyway. I haven't yet decided what I will have on the walls in the tower room. It needs to be something which will show off the Weeping Angel, and if possible I'd like to include some sort of torn-wallpaper homage to the Doctor Who episode 'Blink' which first featured the Weeping Angels.

OR, maybe the damask from Sherlock's apartment:

The Fairfield: Construction Step 6: Stairs & More Walls Glued In Place

After the long delay due to the hibernation of my dollhouse, it's nice to have the stairs finally finished and glued in place. Now I can get on with the rest of the build!

Base of the stairs showing the baseboard on the right hand side.

I knew there would be a small gap to fill in at the bottom of the stairs, but I worked out it was roughly the same size as a newel post when I was doing the dry fit, so I've glued it in place and I think it looks OK, even without a railing. I also stained a small piece of balsa wood cut to shape to frame the lounge room arch and glued it in place - you can just see it running down the edge of the wall in the above pic.

You can also see the small flap I left on the wallpaper where it will join to the tower wall when it is glued in. I won't worry about the others corners so much, but you will be able to see this one from the lounge room, and I don't want there to be any noticeable gaps.

View from the lounge room window

Close up showing the 'wear' I added to the carpet runner

The Fairfield: Stairs Finished... Finally!

I'm afraid I've left the doll house languishing for a few months after I had a little disagreement with  the stairs.

I really, really wanted to add baseboards along the sides of the stairs, the problem being however that I had to sand, sand, sand, sand and sand some more to get them to fit into the space - leaving enough room to fit my Braxton Payne oven along the back kitchen wall.

After a final fit of pique I covered it all and left it alone to go crochet a blanket instead!

 Anyway, it is now school holidays, so with extra time up my sleeve, I uncovered everything and had a final surge on the sanding to get it done. I had previously made the base boards for the sides of the stairs out of balsa wood and stained them with the Wenge gel, and then sealed them with Mod Podge.

Now that they fit, I can move on with the build! Hurrah!