1930s Converse Dollhouse

A recent find was this 1930s Converse dollhouse, made of lithographed wood (the design is printed directly onto the wood, not onto applied paper). It's missing its two front porch pillars, but it's still a lovely little cottage, I thought. It measures 12 inches square by 10 1/2 inches tall, and opens from the right side.

 Access to the single room inside is via the end wall which opens with a knob instead of the more frequently seen latch.

I've furnished it as a cottage for a little 3 inch dime store teddy bear of similar vintage, with pieces made by the Menasha Woodenware Corporation (fireplace excepted). Menasha was founded in 1849 in Wisconsin, and was originally a maker of wooden barrels, tubs, and related items. In the 1930s, they expanded their line to include wooden dollhouse furniture in the 1" to 1 foot scale. This toy furniture, trademarked "Tyke Toys," is hard to find now as it wasn't made for very long, but it kept the company in business through the Great Depression. Menasha pieces are often misidentified as Strombecker, as the two firm's products are rather similar.

A view of the inside from above, with the roof removed.

Two of my favorite Menasha pieces are the kitchen cupboard and the stove.

Looks like the little bear is getting ready to make a berry pie...

Old Dollhouse Grocery Shops

There was such a surprisingly positive reaction to my latest dollhouse grocery shop last week, I thought perhaps I should do a group post (I have six shops so far). So here they all are! They date from 1914 to the 1950s, and include American, German, Danish, and British examples.

My earliest shop was made by the American toy company, Cass, in 1914. It's constructed of cardboard, with a little wooden counter, and measures about 9 inches tall. The base the counter rests on folds up into the store for storage. The cough drop box on the top shelf is original to the store, while the other pieces, while old, are not, but they seemed suitable. It's amazing to me that such a fragile little toy has survived for so long.

On the bottom shelf is one of my oddest old dollhouse food items, a 1 1/2 inch cardboard and tin can of "Heinz Vegetable Salad in Mayonnaise." I nominate it for Most Disgusting-Sounding Canned Food Item ever conceived. Blecch.

Next is my 1920s Danish grocery shop, staffed by a 5 inch Steiff bear. The shop is 16 inches wide by 7 1/2 inches tall. It's made of wood, with a separate counter, and retains many of its original items.

This shop is unusual in that it features a display window, and the back is printed with advertising:

"Could I interest you in some Knakbrod?"

 

Here is the first antique dollhouse shop I acquired: a 1930s German Art Deco style grocery. Made of wood and measuring 14 1/2 inches wide by 8 inches tall, it came with lots of old products, and I've added some more. Some of my loveliest, and oldest, dollhouse food is in this shop, including plaster meats, sausages, and cakes from the late 1800s-1920s.

My 5 inch Steiff bear staffs the cheese and sausage counter:

A closeup of the cake shelves:

Some closeups of the meat and cake items, all very old German-made plaster pieces:

This next shop is a lithographed tin grocery made in America by Wolverine Toys in the 1930s. It's the largest of my shops, measuring 20 1/4 inches wide by 12 inches tall. The two lithographed side panels fold in to close the shop up for storage. It's missing its separate counter, but the phone and scale, as well as most of the products, are original to this set.

Both side panels feature fantastic illustrations of children shopping in the store. On the left side, a little boy in denim overalls and a cap purchases a can of tomatoes and box of tea (?) from a clerk with a '30s platinum marcelled hairdo:

 The right side panel shows an adorable little girl choosing sausages at the butcher's counter:

My smallest dollhouse grocery shop is this one, made in America in the 1940s, wooden, and measuring only 10 inches tall by 4 3/4 inches wide. I believe almost all the products are original to this piece, with the exception of a few Grandmother Stover's and Dolly Dear accessories. The counter features an attached "paper roll" (made of wood) on the left side.

The week's shopping, ready to be bagged.

My most recent, and one of my most unusual, shops, is this 1950s-early '60s British "Circle Grocery", also made of wood. It's quite large, measuring 15 inches wide by 10 inches tall, and distinctively painted in red and turquoise. Being British, it naturally came with lots of packages of tea, as well as many other interesting pieces. The groceries upon the counter are a much smaller scale than those on the shelves, but it all came together and seems to work out. The golliwog sticker on the counter was a premium from Robertson's, which I believe was a preserves manufacturer.

 The itty bitty Ovaltine can and Lyons Ready-Mix Pudding box 

are particularly cute:

Boxed Pewter Dollhouse Tea Set

Another addition to my toy tea set collection, this boxed version dates to 1934, and was made by the H. Fishlove Company of Chicago, who were more frequently producers of novelty joke boxes and gags. The set is pewter (except for the tin tray), and the pieces are rather heavy. The teacups measure 1/2 an inch tall, and the box is 4 1/4 inches wide.

Vintage Boxed Toy Tea Set

Although I don't much like tea in real life, for some reason I love toy tea sets, and am always on the lookout for another one to add to my collection. The dollies and teddy bears just can't get enough tea sets.
My most recent find was this, a very unusual boxed wooden set, circa the 1950s or early '60s. The small box measures just 4 inches wide, and contains a complete set of tiny tea things, along with four legs that, when inserted into the box lid, create a tea table. It's pretty amazing.

The assembled box-table:

Freaky Marx Dollhouse Family

I found this family of vintage dollhouse dolls in their original box while antiquing for my birthday last weekend. They were made by the Marx Company in the early 1960s, and have plastic heads, hands, and shoes on poseable wire bodies with felt clothing. The children are about three inches tall, the parents five.

They're really not terribly attractive dolls, and they're also not nearly as old as most of the dollhouse pieces I usually collect. But here's why I bought them: their faces. Fast, haphazard painting by a factory line employee in Hong Kong has unintentionally resulted in crazy expressions. Mom looks like she's smelled something bad, and dad looks...well, I can't quite place his expression. Chagrin? Discomfort? A guilty conscience? The sudden realization that he left the toilet seat up? Stunned disbelief at learning the swaddled baby isn't his? Who knows, but it's definitely amusing.

Meanwhile, brother's expression can only be described as "shifty", as he glances toward his innocent little sister, malice clearly apparent in his cold, beady eyes:

Silver Dollhouse Decanter Set

I'm always looking for interesting little things to add to my dollhouses, and I found this on my birthday antiquing trip over the weekend: a silver decanter set. It has a Mexican silver hallmark on the underside of the tray, and appears to have some age to it, although I couldn't say exactly how old it may be. The tray measures a little over 4 inches wide, and the mugs are just 1/2 an inch tall. The keg-shaped decanter has a turquoise stopper, and rests on a stand.

My seven inch German doll is just the right size to serve as a barmaid. I expect the teddy bears will be arriving soon, ready to throw a few pints back...

Antique Dollhouse Grocery Store

If you've followed my blog for awhile, you'll know that I love antique dollhouse grocery shops. I found a fabulous one last week, just in time for my birthday, which gave me an excuse to splurge on it. Made in Denmark in the 1920s, it has a glass display window, removeable counter, all of its drawers with their original pulls, and lots of accessories, most of which are original to the shop. The store measures 16 inches wide by 7 inches tall, and the largest product bottle is 2 inches high.

My 5 inch Steiff bear makes a perfect shopkeeper:

Here are some closeups of the products:

 

 

The outside of the shop features colorful signs 

advertising wine and tobacco. 

I'm not sure what "Kobmand" means: any Danish speakers out there?

Schoenhut Dollhouse

One of my birthday gifts this year was a 1930s Schoenhut dollhouse, made of wood and fibreboard with teeny tiny green shutters and printed "wooden" floor coverings. It's a very petite little house, only 10 1/2 inches tall. The roof is a bit crumbly and saggy, but it's still there, along with the often-missing original door.

I've fitted it out with 1/2 inch scale 1920s - 1930s Tootsie Toy furniture and the tiniest dollhouse food I've ever seen, made in England by Dol-Toi. Each plate is just 1/2 an inch wide, and the food, obviously, is even smaller.

Inhabiting the house are a 1920s German dollhouse couple, only 3 1/2 inches tall. They look ready for an evening on the town (or my birthday party).

I think the Mrs. doll was actually meant to be a maid, and that's a maid's cap on her head. But she arrived sans clothes, so I can't be sure. I'm pretending she's wearing a chic 1920s head wrap, instead. Either that, or we pretend she was the maid, but she ran off with the man of the house, seen below, and this is their secret rendevous country cottage.

1910 Star Novelty Company Doll Furniture

As part of last weekend's dollhouse rearranging project, I also spent some time working on some larger furniture that is, sadly, homeless. The scale is so big (1 1/2") that it's all sized more for a small doll instead of a dollhouse. The set was made around 1910 by the Star Novelty Company of Cincinnati, Ohio. Fashioned of oak, the pieces feature details like leatherette seats on the chairs, a mirror on the buffet, and dresden-paper like trim on the china cabinet shelf. The tallest piece, the buffet, measures 8 inches tall. Below, an old German doll and 1920s Schuco miniature bear find the set to be just their size.

The dolly is clearly thinking, "how wonderful Tracy is: 

she bought all this just for me!"

Now she's wondering if she can sneak an apple out of the fruit display without it all tumbling down.

Tea for two. Bear hopes there's honey...

"Don't worry: I'll bring the cake over. 

I can just reach it, if I stand on my toes..."

1890s Dunham's Cocoanut Dollhouse

(This post is especially for Norma, who requested more pictures of my dollhouses!)

When I first started collecting dollhouses and miniatures, one of the pieces I most longed for was the Dunham's Cocoanut Dollhouse, made in America in the 1890s. The odd name belies its origins: the house was originally a packing crate for Dunham's Cocoanut, a shredded confection used for baking, particularly as a cake topping. The 28 inch tall crate originally would have held several boxes of this shredded coconut product, and the house served as an advertising premium.

It's believed the crates arrived in stores already papered inside, ready to be converted into a dollhouse once they were emptied and stood on end. The lithographed floor and wall papers are awash with details, including rugs, tile, and loads of Victorian bric a brac like potted ferns, pianos, paintings, shelves, china cabinets, even a taxidermied moose head and an aquarium full of fish. And, lest we forget this house was essentially a marketing device, the cupboard lithographed on a kitchen wall is stocked full of tiny Dunham's Cocoanut boxes!

The outside of the crate has impressed bricks and windows on each side, and is stamped "Dunham's Cocoanut Dollhouse" on both ends. No one is really sure how the houses were distributed after the coconut was sold, and they are hard to find today. Considering their original purpose, most remaining examples are in rough shape now, with water staining, torn and missing paper, and a prominent crack down the back, caused by the joining of the two planks used to fashion the crate's bottom.  Even so, the house, with its fantastically detailed wallpapers, is a treasure, providing a peek into late Victorian domestic life.

It's also an outstanding example of a very early marketing premium. Besides the house itself, children could send away for individual cardboard pieces of furniture, each emblazoned with the Dunham's logo. You would have had to really like shredded coconut in order to acquire enough pieces to completely furnish the house! This furniture is now exceedingly rare: I've only ever seen one set, and it was in a museum. Consequently, lucky Dunham's house owners fit out their homes with whatever they can find that seems suitable. Mine features a mix of old pieces, including early 1900s German bedroom, dining, and parlor sets, and an American stove and icebox from the 1920s and '30s, along with some other odds and ends. The tour commences below.

The top floor of the house is a bedroom, complete with lace curtained windows. A 4 inch Limbach doll plays with her toys on the floor, next to her German bed with its original coverlet, and a matching wardrobe complete with clothes pegs and a mirrored door.

Down one floor we find the parlor, where a German dollhouse father relaxes on the sofa with his newspapers. The piano is on the wallpaper in the back left corner. The fruit compote dish in this corner is very old and also German made.

Next is the dining room, with the most wonderfully detailed wallpapers in the house: this is where we find the moose head and aquarium. The buffet, table, and chairs are from the same 1900s German set as the bed and wardrobe. I had a lot of fun laying out the breakfast foods and dishes and setting out the tea things on the buffet. The tiny tin trunk is actually a British candy container, which I've filled with extra dishes.

At the bottom of the house is the kitchen. The stove and icebox are American made, and I love the icebox, which came complete with its original glass "ice block". The copper tea kettle on the stove is Dutch. This is the room with the wallpaper cupboard holding the boxes of Dunham's Cocoanut.

I hope you've enjoyed this visit to my Dunham's Cocoanut Dollhouse!