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Dura Craft Bellingham


Argh!

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Hello new friends! We're looking at a dc Bellingham kit still in the box for $75 for our son. This is new to us. What else will we need to buy? My son already has almost all the furniture from the tomy smaller homes. There's a tomy smaller homes house for sale for $200. Which do you think would be best? The Bellingham looks as if the rooms may be awkward to arrange furniture in and they look cramped. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

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First of all you will need to make sure all of the pieces of the kit are there, since Dura-Craft went out of business many years ago.  A coping or other small saw and a miter box will be handy for making the windows and cutting the longframe pieces, and of course a ruler.  Wood glue and a clear-drying tacky glue, of course.  I find a carpenter's square to be helpful building Dura-Craft kits, as well as masking tape and lots of clamps.

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1 hour ago, Mid-life madness said:

How old is your son? I'm partial to the Bellingham!! I have a kit put away. Does he want to build or is young and wants to play?

He's 11 and LOVES building. The Bellingham would be a great project for him and his dad but i worry he'll be unhappy with the room sizes afterward as he is with the lil house i bought for him pictured. I even bought the smaller scale tomy smaller homes furniture to make the most of the room but it doesn't fit either.

20181027_094958.jpg

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22 minutes ago, havanaholly said:

First of all you will need to make sure all of the pieces of the kit are there, since Dura-Craft went out of business many years ago.  A coping or other small saw and a miter box will be handy for making the windows and cutting the longframe pieces, and of course a ruler.  Wood glue and a clear-drying tacky glue, of course.  I find a carpenter's square to be helpful building Dura-Craft kits, as well as masking tape and lots of clamps.

As well as wallpaper and flooring? Do i have to stick to the wall placement? Can i leave the first floor open? Should i add columns for support?

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33 minutes ago, havanaholly said:

First of all you will need to make sure all of the pieces of the kit are there, since Dura-Craft went out of business many years ago.  A coping or other small saw and a miter box will be handy for making the windows and cutting the longframe pieces, and of course a ruler.  Wood glue and a clear-drying tacky glue, of course.  I find a carpenter's square to be helpful building Dura-Craft kits, as well as masking tape and lots of clamps.

As well as wallpaper and flooring? Do i have to stick to the wall placement? Can i leave the first floor open? Should i add columns for support?

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Oops! Posted twice! Sry!

I'd like to not put the upstairs door in and put a window there instead. I'm also considering a spiral staircase or do they take up more room? Also, the little room in the attic on the left? Can't we just leave that open?

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I love the 2nd pic! Idt the pic i posted is a kit. I think it's homemade. The front walls and floors are pieces of paneling and the sides are solid. The cool thing is, the walls are notched so the floors silde out. I rly like that option. It made it a lot easier to paint the walls and add carpet. Btw - I've searched the for interior pics if the Bellingham and never saw that 2nd pic so thank you for that!

20181025_102735.jpg

20181025_102712.jpg

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It looks to me as if the little attic room to the left has a wall that is part of the gable for the roof, so you would need to do some bashing and consider an alternative way to stop the roof sagging. The other walls all look movable or removable. Just consider the fact that walls hold up floors and you may need to reinforce your upper floors. If the Bellingham is an mdf model you probably won’t have to worry about support You could also move the stairs if your husband has any woodworking tools by filling in the original hole and cutting a stair well hole somewhere less obtrusive.  I have to say though. All dollhouse rooms are on the small side unless you get into the really big models.. They are not scaled to modern house room styles so they will always seem a little pokey. Removing walls is your best option.

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he got this for his 11th bday. His sister got a dc farmhouse 500 i found at a yard sale. Both got a house full of tomy smaller homes furniture. This house will likely be a vacation cabin for his military dudes after he gets a bigger house. He also rly enjoys fixing up the yard and porch.

20181025_102751.jpg

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I did a Bellingham rehab- loved that house!  Huge and HEAVY!  LOL  Great house for kids to play with.  I do agree that the rooms may be considered small, so moving walls is always an option.  I rearranged some of the walls in mine.  You could even totally eliminate the stairs in favor of more floor space!

If this is a kit- I highly recommend doing the dry-fit as mentioned above. Then once you have a sense of what you want and where, you can do priming, painting and even wallpapering before assembly.  And that weird little attic room to the left?  My thought was to adjust the roof line- in other words, cut some of the roof out so the room can actually be accessed and used as an attic space!  

The house made of old paneling made me smile!  I recently did a rehab house that was built with paneling as well.  Took a LOT of spackle to smooth out those walls!

I am not totally familiar with the Tomy furniture - -although there are several pieces that would be great for my 1970's Artply Highland.  Are they a true 1:12?

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This seller has complete rooms of tomy smaller homes furniture for sale. You can check out their other listings to see the other rooms. I didn't spend nearly this much tho. I bought lots of it here and there until they each had a full house. Some things, like the oven tower and the kitchen bar and stools are a lot harder to find.

https://m.bonanza.com/listings/vintage-tomy-smaller-homes-dollhouse-furniture-living-room-den-extras/642159788?goog_pla=1&gpid=318766196099&keyword=&goog_pla=1&pos=1o10&ad_type=pla&gclid=CjwKCAiAiarfBRASEiwAw1tYv4I66mqpyaSkT1RJBr8m1da8pEoR411-CzXQPeVQzaTySvJhZC_NUhoCaHsQAvD_BwE

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Note re the tomy furniture - if you go for it, learn all the pieces so you can buy lots that have the more rare pieces. The house came by itself and the rooms were sold separately. Some pieces were sold as add ons like the oven tower, bar set, games, etc.

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Kathy- I just went thru my old pics and posted a few more of them to my Bellingham album.  You can go to my albums on my profile and see all of the pics. Unfortunately I don't seem to have an AFTER pic of the entire interior.....could take one though.  :) 

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On 11/14/2018, 3:58:52, jbnmini said:

Kathy- I just went thru my old pics and posted a few more of them to my Bellingham album.  You can go to my albums on my profile and see all of the pics. Unfortunately I don't seem to have an AFTER pic of the entire interior.....could take one though.  :) 

I love it!! Thank you for posting!!

Lil guy has decided on a totally different lil house - a Melissa and Doug Victorian mansion for $50. He may want to do a build later but he's impatient to get his furniture and military dudes settled in a house.

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2 hours ago, Argh! said:

I love it!! Thank you for posting!!

Lil guy has decided on a totally different lil house - a Melissa and Doug Victorian mansion for $50. He may want to do a build later but he's impatient to get his furniture and military dudes settled in a house.

That’s a good choice for a boy his age. Very well made and sturdy.

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