Ceiling height and Aster Cottage

[KatFord 86]

Has anyone else noticed the first-floor ceiling height seems very low in the Aster Cottage? I'm a bit disappointed. I don't visualize very well, I have to actually see something in place to get the dimension of it. I put the second floor in and the ceiling almost touches my 1:12 scale doll's head! I don't even have room to put a light in. I splurged on a light fixture because I've looked everywhere for one just like the picture I'm following and I can't even use it. 

Kim

[havanaholly 11,032]

The Aster could be proportioned similarly to the Sugarplum.  1:16 works quite well for those smaller heights.  They're in scale for the historical period they're most common to, I suspect, and people were a lot shorter then, plus they didn't have to fool with electric lighting.

[KathieB 5,807]

It is frustrating to have a particular plan in mind only to find out that it won't work in a particular house or that the house itself demands something totally different. Ask Holly, who's plan to create Miss Marple's cottage turned into a jolly pub instead. Or when my plan to build a regular 1:12 scale houseboat turned into a 1:24 scale two-story houseboat containing a two-story formal ballroom housing a retired merchant marine captain who happens to be a bullfrog. Or a farmhouse that I just couldn't bring myself to finish until it let me know that it wanted to be a haunted hangout for a gang of skeletons! Who'd have thought? We have learned to listen to the kits and follow their lead rather than trying to impose our will on them.

Your Aster is telling you something. It seems as if your inspiration photo isn't going work in this house. You need to listen to the house and go with the flow (as we aging flower children used to say).  

If you share your inspiration photo, perhaps someone here can suggest a house that would suit it better than the Aster.

[fov 1,919]

I haven't built this house, but I looked at a picture and the second story seems to be unusually spacious for a little house. Could you bash it to steal some of that space for the downstairs? Cut new slots, higher up on the wall, to insert the floor/ceiling piece into?

I'd move the floor all the way up to where the slanted part of the roof starts. You'd have to modify or close up the second floor windows, but you'd still have that nice big dormer upstairs.

[KatFord 86]

Part of the problem is that I bashed the 2nd floor by taking away the loft... my bad. I wanted a full floor up there. Had I left it alone it would be fine. Oh well. I'll figure something out. Unfortunately, this house doesn't get a say in what it's used for. I can't afford to buy another house right now, and this project is something I've wanted to do for years and now I'm to far in to stop. I'll figure something out. 

Thanks for the ideas. And in the future, I'll let the house have a little more say. 

Kim

[havanaholly 11,032]

Fingers crossed you're one of those folks who can impose your vision on a kit; as Kathie mentioned, it sure doesn't seem to work for me.