I saw this lovely German Dollhouse on eBay last week. This dollhouse was purchased by the seller's grandmother a long time ago. The dollhouse, she was told, was built for a granddaughter, “Gerda”, and there is a sign on the house that says “Villa Gerda”. On the window of the main door to the house, it reads, “Gerda Doll, Weihnachten 1932”.
This three story house has two beautiful staircases that wind to the floor above. These staircases are well built with wood that has a beautiful grain and the staircase walls are encased in wood also. There are handrails, banisters and it is detailed with realistic overhang of the treads over the wooden risers. The floors of these two rooms are made with the same wood as the staircase. The craftsmanship is wonderful in the house and is shown very much in the quality of the furniture!
Each room is nicely decorated with wallpaper and there are baseboards throughout the house. There are nine wood wrapped windows and cute brass adjustable curtain rods. The second floor has French doors opening out onto a balcony. There are also French doors on the main level from the middle room. The main entrance is behind the staircase on the main floor. Each of these doors has three wooden steps leading to ground level.
The furniture is amazing! Every piece has Gerda Doll's initials, the date (1932) and the family crest on them except for the hanging kitchen shelf with hooks, chase lounge, and black piano. It looks like they must have been painstakingly hand painted since each piece is unique, but it has a look of lithography since they are so finely detailed. The beds and the top of the table also show a uniformed man holding the crest with an animal on each side and with a banner along the bottom that says "Noblesse Oblige." as well as the date and initials. Everything is so beautifully decorated with tiny scrolled patterns. The drawers and doors work well on each piece of furniture. There are many gold finishing nails on everything. The furniture is not merely glued together, it is held together with hundreds of tiny little nails. Even the tiny drawers are nailed together. There are 31 pieces of furniture.
The sofa is upholstered in what looks like imitation chocolate brown leather with many tiny gold nails. There are two small shelves built into the back maybe for candlesticks.The two single beds have tufted red mattresses with a matching tufted pillow for each. Each bed also has two blankets, one is red and one is white. The white one is made to look like a feather tick. There is a red pillow with a white, lace-trimmed pillowcase for each bed also. These are so very darling and they look like they would be fun to crawl into if we were only the right size!
There is a sweet desk with seven shelves on top with a black desktop. There is a wonderful vintage metal candlestick phone that sits on it. The earpiece is removable and mouthpiece moves up and down. A black book entitled “A good book is the best of friends, the same today and forever.” is sitting on it. It says “Caxton Printers, Ltd.” inside and there is a picture of William Caxton on the inside. The pages are thread sewn in and have gold on the edges.
Here are some photos my friend Naved took at the Baltimore Museum of Art. The Thorne Miniature Rooms were on a traveling exhibit at the museum.
