The Miniature House Review
Small-scale replicas have an enduring fascination, creating as they do the world in miniature. Among the most popular replicas are miniature houses, which through the centuries have been carefully built, furnished with exquisitely wrought pieces, and peopled by fashionable dressed dolls. These houses, though occasionally created for children, have more often been commissioned by adult connoisseurs as displays for exquisite miniature craftsmanship, and they survive as time capsules of their period, depicting different modes of interior design.
This lavishly illustrated volume presents some of the finest miniature houses from across Europe and the United States to show a variety of traditions and national styles. Among these are Princess Augusta Dorothea's re-creation of her own 18th century German court, complete with chapel and convent; a Dutch miniature house built into a display cabinet; American silent-film star Colleen Moore's fairy-tale castle with working fountains and a diamond-and-emerald chandelier; and an English stately home, realistic outside as well as in.
The 131 photographs in 'The Miniature House' illustrate a remarkable sequence of rooms from attics to basements and focus on their incredibly detailed furniture and decorative elements - from a tiny Chippendale chair to a cut-glass scent bottle. A final chapter looks at the dolls that inhabit these setting; in addition to their fascination for us as miniature actors on a stage, they provide a unique opportunity to study period clothing in detail, as well as the social hierarchy in households of past centuries. Read more...
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