Missing parts

[Bigdreamer]

New here, I hope I am posting this in the right area. For an early Mother’s Day gift, my kids and husband bought me the orchid dollhouse. Unfortunately my autistic son took it upon himself to assemble it for me “ahead of time”. The problem is I think that the box may have been a return because some of the parts are missing or were broken and he did not reach out to my husband. At this point, it cannot be returned because he has assembled it minus the missing or broken parts. I have tried calling the number for missing parts, but the voicemail box is full. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you

[fov]

Welcome to the forum. Have you tried emailing customerservice@greenleafdollhouses.com? They're a small company so sometimes it takes a little while to hear back.

Which pieces are missing/broken? Sometimes there are easy substitutes.

 

[Bigdreamer]

Ladder completely missing, all the lower and middle flat trim, and several of the gables were missing or broken, as well as the stair railing and hand rails.

* I hope I am using all the correct terminology. Noob

Edited May 16, 2023 by Bigdreamer

[fov]

Luckily stairs and railings are easily replaced (a lot of people choose to do that regardless, to upgrade from what comes in the kit). Take a look at miniatures.com and look at the last page of the ecatalog for coupons. Greenleaf would probably charge for replacement sheets anyway, so this might be more cost effective.

These are what I used in the Orchid:

https://www.miniatures.com/Simple-Stair-Kit-P17202.aspx

https://www.miniatures.com/Porch-Posts-P17136.aspx

https://www.miniatures.com/Porch-Spindles-P17128.aspx

https://www.miniatures.com/Porch-Railing-Set-P17135.aspx

Strip wood (also available at miniatures.com) can be substituted for trim. The gable pieces can be made out of wood or matboard -- just trace the broken pieces or trace around the the inside edge of the cutout from the kit sheet.

If you use matboard, you can even trace the gable roof pieces back-to-back and score/fold the line where they meet, which will make it easier to assemble them since you won't have to worry about getting the angle right when you glue. You can get one big piece of matboard at a hobby store like Michaels for just a few dollars; it's about the same thickness as the kit wood and won't require the sanding and prep work of wood.

Another idea is to buy a second kit from a store like Hobby Lobby, especially if you can find a 40% off coupon online. It's an inexpensive kit, and again since Greenleaf would charge for the replacement sheets, it might be cheaper for you. If you're feeling ambitious you could use the extra parts to bash the house to give it another bay window, another story, etc.

[havanaholly]

I've built the Orchid in both wood and plastic, and I don't recall balusters or banisters for the stairs in either kit.  I glued a piece of stripwood to the wall in the wood version just because I had it:

and in the plastic version I just used the stairs as is: