My great-grandmother's husband, Bill, built it for me when I was a little girl. He built furniture to match. Little beds and cupboards, built-ins and tiny logs for the fire. Twenty-years ago, the house was retired. To storage where it waited patiently for a new generation of children to ignore its broken stairs and peeling wallpaper... My plan was to restore the house. Glue new paper to its bathroom floor. Repaint the walls on which I once plastered Rainbow Brite stickers. But then it arrived. In its run-down glory, floors peeling like years gone and I changed my mind. Some historical landmarks need not be renovated, lest they lose their history. To restore it to its original luster would be to destroy its beloved stain, its haunting strange and lovable creep.
Ghostbusters, be gone.
GGC
29 comments:
holy shit, that is childhood all summed up. brilliant!
to restore it, would be like taking a sander to the tree trunk with initials carved in it long ago.
chel
These photos are beautiful! I only wish I had a dollhouse like that to hand down to my little gal...
Oh MAN. Those photos make me all swoony. It must have been such a treat to take a photo safari in and out of the rooms you loved so well. How cool to have it be introduced to a new generation.
Love these pictures! I always wanted one of those fancy, real-life dollhouses, but had to settle for my bright pink barbie house It was still awesome, by the way. I just never understood why they made the furniture so damn small for her long, long legs...
I love it! I would like to come up with some witty banter that pays appropriate love to the icons of our childhood and also incorporates a well meaning barb about crack houses, but my coffee's barely down, so just know that those leetle pictures of that leetle world gave me a morning smile.
That picture of Archer through the doorway is lovely! And are those mini Blythe dolls?!??! Where did you find them?
Beautiful. I cannot wait to get a dollhouse for my daughter...mine is long gone.
I am so impressed with your photography of the thing - esp the pic of yer boy in the doorway, fantastic! It is like a little time capsule, isn't it? Reminds me, decaying floors & all, of our first house...terribly endearing in it's aging and loved-ness.
I just love it! The photos are fantastic, and all the little Calico Critters/dolls/Littlest Pet Shop animals in their various locations and poses made me smile. I keep hoping to find a dollhouse similarly well-loved for Zinashi at a flea market or junk shop, since I didn't have one as a child, but no luck yet. It won't be as good without knowing the house's story and being part of it, but at the same time, I think we can probably imagine a story for it in a pinch.
I know this is off the topic of today's post but thank you SO much for introducing Arcade Fire to me!! I never listen to your mixed tape songs (sorry) but I was so curious to hear the song that Fable listens to at full volume that I clicked on the link to the original version and fell in love. I'm liking their other songs too. Hooray!
I'm loving the photography on this! It's messing with my head, because I know it's a doll house, but it looks real... very cool!
Oh, it's beautiful! I'd love to have a dollhouse like that. You are a wonderful storyteller.
Amazing photography! Very haunting but tender and innocent.
Always thought it would be cool to decorate a dollhouse and bring the miniatures to life in a more modern way.
Beautiful...and beautiful photography. Love the one where you can see Archer from the door! thanks for sharing! That's awesome that Archer and Fable can be introduced to your generation.
Love love LOVE these photos, Rebecca! Really, gorgeous.
The different scales in the photos is blowing my mind a little. In a good way.
Magnificent!
Rainbow Brite rocks - you made the right choice to leave it "as is" - it looks ready for another generation of little girls!
These are SO neat! So fun to look at!!
Okay, I agree with the beautiful assessment, but it also made me think of the house in Inception. The one the wife locked her totem in? Also, that bathroom could be the scene of a grisly murder. Am I demented?
Do I spy some Maple Town animals?
The Blythe petsitter in the tub has clearly just chased a handful of pills with a bottle of gin, and the tiny mouse/cat has no intention of intervening.
Please call for help.
(also the picture of Archer through the doorway is SO COOL!)
My inner-child is terribly jealous...
Are those Littles? My girl has a dollhouse my sister made her when she was going through a dollhousing phase. I found all the Littles furniture my mom kept from 1982 and combined it with a bunch of Polly Pockets and Littlest Pet Shop and mini Cabbage Patch Kids and My Little Ponies and now it is a heinous mash-up of my childhood and hers. And I love it.
I love that dollhouse just in that condition. beautiful
I am sending this to my husband and BEGGING him to make one for me. . .I mean our daughter.
What a beautiful dollhouse!
These pictures are stunning. Seriously. they should be an installation somewhere
The photos are really wonderful. Dollhouses are magical. I once saw a house all open to the elements. One section was to be moved and had been pulled away. The remainder was left open like a dollhouse. I had so wished I'd stopped to photograph it. The things I imaged.
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