Making a Kakelugn (Swedish Tiled Stove)

This weekend I started working on the kakelugn, or tiled stove for the dinning room of my Swedish dollhouse. I wanted it to sit in the corner and look something like this: 

I started with a piece of old floorboard I found in the shed, it was about 3cm thick. I cut it to a rectangle and also chamfered the edges to get the correct shape. 

I cut the piece in half and trimmed the back off the longer piece so it would be set back from the bottom piece when I glued them together. 

I glued them together using a basewood backing (which allowed me to pack out the bottom piece just a smidge more. 

Kakelugn stoves were tiled, so I cut out about 50 "tiles" from which card in order to give the effect.

I glued the tiles on and also edged the corner and base of the bottom piece with pre-milled timber trim. 

These stoves also sat on little legs, so I rummaged through my off-cuts/scrap box and found these balustrading  pieces I had kept when I shortened some for the American house. The little end bits were perfect legs. 

For the first coat of paint I used spray paint. I did this because if I had used a water based paint it would have damaged the card tiles. 

I fashioned the top, but left it plain without any embellishment  This was partly because I haven't yet quite worked out how to do a bit of a fleur de lis. I used a cornice piece upside-down to do this. 

I like how it fits in the room. 

Now all that is left is to make the door and other brass parts, paint the flower design on it and spay it with a clear gloss spray paint (to get the effect of shiny tiles).  

Stay tuned! 

Some Furniture for the Bedroom

I have finally organised enough furniture to furnish the main bedroom of the American house. The chest is a House of Miniatures kit, the little mirror vanity on top is a McQueenie kit. They both suit the room quite well. 

There is a little chest (perhaps with some secret letters of jewelry) under the bed (another McQueenie kit). 

Some nice Edward Hopper paintings on the walls - a classic American artist. 

The key to unlock the box under the bed perhaps?

Detail a beautiful hand made mahogany bed I bought from the USA. 

Door Tutorial and a Small Bit of Progress on the Swedish House

Since I have spent so much time on the American House, my little Swedish House has been quite neglected. I had the whole weekend to work on it. At the beginning of the weekend it was still just a shell, but I have done some work now to make it look much more like a little house. 

I decided to being with the bottom right hand room, which is to be the dinning room. The first thing I needed to do was to make some nice doors. I have noticed that in many neoclassical scandinavian country houses small double doors are used in the main rooms. 

Simple and low wall panelling was common too. I think this was mainly because of the habit of placing chairs against the walls. The wood panelling saved the wallpaper from scuffs. 

To make the doors I started with two thicknesses of basewood. Basewood is a type of hardwood that is similar to balsa wood in appearance, but not so soft that it is damaged easily.

I cut the basewood to the correct door shapes.

I layered it once it was cut so that the thicker piece was in the centre, and the on either side were the thinner pieces. 

Before I glued it I cut the panel pattern out of the thin pieces for the outside. 

Then I glued the three layers together. 

Once they were together I lined the inside of the panels with some moulding, and added a smaller panel of wood to the centre. 

This gave quite a realistic finish without too much trouble. 

 I then worked on the walls (because they detach from the room) and added architrave and panelling. I used a very similar technique to the doors for the wall panelling.

I did a base coat of white paint on the panelling and doors and temporarily hung the chandelier. I really like how it is shaping up, even though the walls are still raw MDF.

I will now have to finish the panelling. After that, I will have to decide on a colour scheme for the walls, be it wall paper or trompt l'oeil. Then I will have to construct a tiled stove or kakelugn, and do the floors!