Welcome to the Dollhouse
Sometimes it feels silly to have a dollhouse hobby but then I think, what if Jim Henson had been discouraged from creating and working with puppets, then we would have never known the magic of The Muppets and Sesame Street, or The Dark Crystal. And I think of the enchantment my favorite children’s book authors and illustrators have contributed to the world such as Trina Schart Hyman, Jill Barklem, Graham Rust, Lisbeth Zwerger, and Jerry Pinkney to name a few. And what young child isn’t completely fascinated by Richard Scarry’s fictional world of friendly critters running their errands in Busytown, or the expressive emotions of Lisa and her teddy bear in Don Freeman’s Corduroy, or the vibrant and colorful images in The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats? There’s something comforting in knowing that these authors and creators were born to tell both fanciful and moving stories in playful ways, and that those of us who are brave enough to honor the call might succeed in doing so ourselves, or at the very least, serve to inspire. Illustration combined with dollhouse storytelling might be an uncommon hobby, but it has become an amusing way to express my inner world and point of view with those who happen upon it.
A collection of teddy bears in my childhood bedroom.
It’s easy to romanticize the past, but my 1980s childhood was the best! My nostalgia for that glitzy decade is boundless with warm memories of carefree hours of (mostly) unsupervised play and unstructured time to explore and daydream. There was a certain kind of freedom in growing up in a time when Wi-Fi didn’t exist. It all feels so quaint by today’s standards, but I feel lucky to be a part of Gen X. I had plenty of neighborhood friends to play with, but growing up as an only child allowed for an active imagination that kept me company at home. It also meant that I had a ton of toys. I vividly remember going to Service Merchandise during the Cabbage Patch Kid craze and watching my doll come down the conveyor belt. And the Christmas of 1985 when I received the animatronic talking wonder, Teddy Ruxpin and his best friend Grubby (I still have them). So many things are ordered online these days that it’s easy to forget how big of a deal it was to take a trip to the toy store, especially to Toys R Us with its long aisles of every popular toy imaginable. It was a dream space for kids, but I would imagine it was an absolute nightmare for parents!
This is the 1986 Kiss & Cuddle Heart Family that I once had. Image shared with permission from an eBay seller.
Though teddy bears and other types of stuffed animals were my preferred toys, I did have a small collection of Barbie dolls that I adored. My friends and I would spend hours coming up with dramatic doll play scenarios, probably influenced by the TV shows our parents watched, like daytime soaps and epic primetime series such as Dynasty. This was the Superstar Barbie era (1977-1988): our dolls were unapologetically glamorous and wore a lot of lace, sparkles and formal gowns. Instead of actual dollhouses, we had vinyl carrying cases that would open up to reveal rooms with twin beds and a wardrobe space. Corners in playrooms or spaces under tables would also be transformed into makeshift living spaces for our Barbies. My best friend and I each had waterbeds (because… the 80s), and we were extremely proud of ourselves upon discovering that wrapping water-filled Ziploc bags in small terrycloth towels and placing them into empty shoe boxes, created perfect Barbie sized waterbeds to match our own. Good times! I had all of my original Barbies up until around 2014 when the KonMari method inspired the mass purging of clutter. Now that I have a 1:6 scale dollhouse hobby I regret giving them away, especially my Heart Family, including the grandparents and the pink VW Cabriolet. Nowadays these very same dolls are quite pricey if you can find them in mint condition.
The Volkswagen Cabriolet AKA the Rabbit Convertible was my IRL dream car as a child, because all of the coolest teenagers had one. Well, at least in the movies they did. My dream came true in the late 1990s when I got my driver’s license and first set of wheels. It was white with a black top, and I loved zipping around town in that car. I hope Volkswagen brings back the Cabrio someday! Image shared with permission from an eBay seller.
The 1970s Barbie Dream House. The dreamiest of all the Barbie dream houses, in my humble opinion.
Though my friends and I were happy to create our own doll living spaces, the ultimate in Barbie living was the 1970s and 80s A-frame Barbie Dream House. This was the one toy I couldn’t convince my parents to buy. None of my friends had it, either! It was like this mythical object we all longed for but only got to see on TV commercials or packed away on store shelves. There was no only-child-Veruca-Salt-ing my way into proud Dream House ownership. In the end, it came down to aesthetics and practicality. My mother kept a meticulous house; there was a place for everything to be put away when the fun was done. She knew that once the massive 3 x 4 ft house was set up, that it would not be coming down. Of all the Barbie Dream Houses over the years, I think this model has the coolest design.
There’s something so charming about scaled down objects and miniature houses, especially the classic 1:12 scale. All the comforts of home captured in such tiny detail is captivating to look at. Though I had always wanted a proper dollhouse as a child, a serious interest in miniatures didn’t take off until my twenties. In the early 2000s I bought a 1:24 scale dollhouse at an antique store, but it’s a challenging scale to work with, so I never really did anything with it. Today, it sits atop a wardrobe closet in my bedroom. I like to think that it’s secretly inhabited by a house gnome or two, and not just sitting there all sad and empty.
It was around this same time when I discovered a book called, Tasha Tudor’s Dollhouse: A Lifetime in Miniature. As a child I was familiar with Tasha Tudor’s illustrations from the 1985 Harper Collins edition of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, but it wasn’t until finding her dollhouse book, that I discovered the magical woman behind the illustrations. Her life seemed so dreamy and ideal that I half wanted to run off to homestead in the Vermont countryside. It’s quite laughable now! I adore and frequent the quiet natural rhythms of the forest and the countryside, but I’m much better suited to a more cosmopolitan lifestyle. Although our lives are worlds apart, I recognize in Tahsa a kindred spirit in whimsy. Her delicate illustrations are lovely, but her miniature world was what really captured my heart. Her handcrafted dolls Emma and Thaddeus, and the stories she created about them, quickly became a centerpiece of Tudor family lore. Tasha’s real life was a lot less ideal than what she depicted in her artwork, but family dysfunction and challenge is unfortunately a common human experience. Her estranged daughter, Bethany, once described her mother as a two-faced eccentric. Yikes! But maybe the dysfunction is what drove Tasha to create such idealized fictional worlds. Perhaps it provided respite from harsh realities.
Originally I planned to tell Fleurette’s story through watercolor illustration only, but after the Barbie movie frenzy during the summer of 2023, I started to think again about that Barbie Dream House I wanted as a kid. One day while pinning images of vintage Barbie houses on Pinterest, I suddenly had the amusing realization that no one could stop me from buying one now! But what good would it be to have the house if I didn’t have a doll to live in it? And that’s when I thought, if someone as beloved as Tasha Tudor could spread joy and wonderment through illustrations and a magical dollhouse hobby, so could I!
The Malaville Lola doll with her ginger hair and freckles. The perfect doll to represent Fleurette!
It couldn’t be just any doll, though. It had to look like the illustrations of Fleurette, which meant that it sort of had to resemble me. I started searching for my doll look-alike on eBay and Etsy, but with no success. The vintage (pre 2000s) Barbies lack in diversity as far as skin tone, hair color and texture. And though the modern Barbies have more diversity, the dolls of today tend to be very trendy in appearance with elaborate makeup and such. At one point I thought about having a dollmaker create a custom 1:6 scale doll, or maybe like Tasha Tudor, attempt to make one myself (which would actually be pretty cool and an idea that’s not completely off the table). But I had a vague memory of a doll I read about in a fashion magazine many years ago, that wasn’t exactly what I was looking for, but could possibly represent Fleurette better than any of the others I had seen so far.
After typing a few key words into the search engine, to my surprise, I found the doll! She was called Malina and was part of an original collection of four dolls created by fashion model Mala Bryan, who founded Malaville Toys in 2015. As a doll collector, Mala Bryan was also frustrated with the lack of diverse black and brown skin tones and hair textures in the fashion doll world, so she turned her hobby into a business of her own as a way to bring much needed diversification to the toy industry. Her dolls have sweet and kind expressions, and manage to convey natural beauty and glamour all at once. Each doll comes with a job title and background story as well. Once again, I was fascinated and impressed that someone managed to turn a playful hobby into a purpose that could benefit all.
My collection of Malaville Dolls (and a toy poodle I made using felt and bouclé yarn).
I was thrilled to find out that Malaville Toys was still in production and had in mind to purchase Malina, but I soon discovered that it had been a limited edition doll and no longer available. It turns out that only 2,500 of each doll from each collection is made, so once they are gone, that’s it! But I was pleasantly surprised, shocked even, to discover that her latest collection included a doll named Lola. A doll not only with freckles, but with ginger hair. A doll with my own features! If I had had this kind of doll as a child, I might have better appreciated my ginger strands. I spent years of my childhood and adolescence being embarrassed by my hair color, even attempting to dye it black at one point during my teen years (very Anne girl of me. IYKYK). The struggle is real when you’re a young person trying to fit in.
Natural red hair occurs in 1-2% of the world population with gingers of color being even more rare. I am grateful that Malaville Toys included both ginger hair and albinism (which also runs in my family), in their latest collection. My hair color comes from both sides of the family tree: from my paternal grandmother’s Jamaican descent and from my maternal grandfather’s Irish and African descent. It’s more of a deep auburn now vs the bright ginger of my early childhood, but in the direct sunlight the brighter tones still shine through. For many years I wished it away, but I can now say that I love my hair color. Representation is so important for children’s sense of self and wellbeing, and I would hope for adult collectors, too.
Fleurette and her toy poodle, Bunny.
After discovering and securing the perfect doll, I focused again on finding a dollhouse. When I would come across a 1970s/80s Barbie Dream House in decent condition (that wasn’t a gazillion dollars), it would usually be missing an essential part or two. Impatient and eager to begin my photographic storytelling, I ended up purchasing a few other dollhouses including the 1992 Barbie Fold ‘n Fun House, along with the 2008 Hannah Montana Malibu Beach House dollhouse, with the intention to “renovate” them. The plan was to use the beach house as the main dwelling, and the Fold ‘n Play as the backyard studio or guest house. The issue with this plan was that it would require a large surface area to set up in order to photograph well, similar to that of a model train display. I would essentially need an empty extra room or a finished basement for the kind of set up I had in mind. The beach house is cute, but it’s really only good for exterior shots, as the interior is limited in size and shape, so extra diorama rooms would be needed for detailed interior photos. This doll world vision of mine was starting to become complicated, but it didn’t stop me from continuing to look for and collect doll furniture and accessories for later use.
Tuesday Taylor’s Penthouse Apartment, Ideal Toy Company 1976. Yes, please! When can I move in?
As I fell further down the rabbit hole of all things 1:6 scale living, I started to notice Barbie clones and other types of fashion dolls such as Tuesday Taylor and her disco chic penthouse city apartment (which is almost impossible to find). This doll was known for her rotating scalp, which allowed her to change from blonde to brunette on a whim. She also had rooted eyelashes, and a flexible waist and wrists. Some versions of the dolls could tan when placed out in the sun. I adore the 1970s/80s Barbie Dream House because of my nostalgia, but Tuesday Taylor’s living situation is the kind of lifestyle I actually want in real life!
Barbie’s Dream House is for the suburbs, Taylor’s penthouse is what city dreams are made of. Not only did she have a sophisticated city dwelling, but also a fabulous summer/winter vacation home, because a city girl needs a retreat away from the hustle and bustle of daily life. Obviously! The vacation home was a two-for-one structure that could be transformed according to the season: a sunny beach backdrop for relaxing coastal getaways and a snow-capped mountain range backdrop for cozy winter retreats. Saint-Tropez or St. Moritz anyone?
On a side note, I wish I had understood as a young person that one could choose a career in product design or as a toy engineer. It never occurred to me probably because it wasn’t one of those serious job titles that we were told to say we wanted when we grew up. But really, how fun it must be to come up with these concepts and to market them! I can think up a ton of ideas.
Before the 1970s/80s Barbie Superstar era, Mattel created play sets with more variety of color, matching the aesthetic of the times, and not with the overabundance of pink we associate with Barbie accessories today. Many vintage Barbie playhouses, especially from the 1950s and 60s used more natural color themes, but they were made with materials such as cardboard and vinyl, so are therefore are extremely rare to find in good condition. Once I discovered the life and style of the Tuesday Taylor doll, I started to expand my search beyond what Barbie and Mattel had to offer.
Sindy, the British fashion doll, created in 1963 by Pedigree Dolls & Toys.
It was ultimately the accessories and home furnishings of Sindy, a British fashion doll created in 1963, that inspired the direction I wanted to take in creating my own doll world. I fell in love with the “scenesetter” dollhouse decor, as it reminded me of the 1970s/80s aesthetic of my childhood, especially the mustard yellow kitchen appliances.
I’m not a huge fan of today’s mainstream decor style as in retailers such as Restoration Hardware or Pottery Barn, for example. I can see how a neutral (safe) color palette can be soothing and elegant in many ways, but I prefer some personality or a dash of kitsch when it comes to living spaces. If it’s going to be neutral, at least let there be artistic flair! I love living spaces with lots of books, rooms with statement wallpaper, displayed cherished objects and art collected through travel or on thrifting adventures. And I adore rooms with unique mix-and-match furniture that somehow fit together harmoniously, a dwelling that lets you know the heart of the person who lives in it. Naturally, the fashion doll furniture of today is the scaled down version of current mainstream style, with the more commercial and affordable options still mostly made in shades of pink. Nothing against the color pink, I love it! But thank goodness for the retro realism of vintage Sindy doll accessories.
As a competitor to Barbie, Sindy was marketed as a girl-next-door type, being less glamorous but more relatable in appearance and fashion sense. The extensive range of realistic looking accessories are what make her doll world so much fun! It took some time, but I was able to collect pieces and sometimes entire sets, still with their original packaging, of “scenesetter” items. Most were shipped from the UK or Canada, as the marketing of the doll wasn’t as successful here in the US.
The houses made specifically for fashions dolls are fun and nostalgic, and Sindy has some adorable options, but I wanted more interior space to work with so that I could indulge in the setup and decor of each room. So I decided to have a custom dollhouse made. Inspired by the 1983 Sindy Super Home townhouse, I hired a carpenter who was able to make two separate units that I could combine together to make one big house. With the castor wheels the units are about 4.5ft tall, and when placed together side by side, they span a little over 6ft across. And there’s approximately 21 inches of depth, so there’s plenty of comfortable space for 1:6 scale living. It took two round trips, but luckily each unit just made it to fit in the back of the SUV. Phew! They were sized to be neatly tucked away and on display in the closet of my office/studio, but I had not factored in the lack of natural lighting for photography. So I ended up clearing a space along a wall in my studio and in its new position, the late afternoon sunlight illuminates the dollhouse with a golden glow. Perfect!
My real life dream home situation would be to live in a townhouse with a luxurious rooftop garden lounge, in or very close to a fabulous city located not far from the sea. Not too much to ask, right? So why not give Fleurette the life she deserves? Mais bien sûr! I adore all things beauty, style and home decor, so creating a dollhouse world has not only been a fun creative outlet, but it’s somewhat therapeutic as well. I’ve already started putting together a classic blue & white bedroom suite, a 1970s inspired formal living/dining room, and a rooftop garden lounge. The rooftop, which includes a plunge pool and fire pit, is nearly complete! Maybe in some way, creating this fantasy miniature version of my own dream house will manifest a similar reality in the future. Hmmm… I shall see! Please make sure to sign up for the Café de Fleurette newsletter for updates on dollhouse decor and other magical miniature musings.
