This Old House - number 50

 

I saw this one on Market Place and felt an immediate connection to it. I dont know why, it just looked sad, as if it remembered being very  much loved and was aware that it no longer was. I emailed the seller who knew nothing about it and persuaded him to post it. It seems to me that risking handing a beaten up old doll's house into the hands of a courier is not so risky as a pristine example. I paid him, and then spent an anxious few weeks waiting for delivery. I began to fear I'd been scammed, and many would say I have been.

When I opened the box, the smell of mice and old straw flooded into my kitchen. Warily, I parted the packing which consisted of newpaper, bits of cardboard and several very ancient, moth eaten pillows that went straight in the bin. I lifted the house out and put in on the side and it smiled at me.

Rust has eaten away at the badly repainted front but I quite like that, it is part of its history. I opened the door, the smell of mice growing stronger the deeper I delved. Inside were various pieces of vintage furniture which I put to one side for a very hot wash, I even found a few mangled, mouse chewed people whom I also put to one side.

The interior wall paper was hanging off.  The stairs had also fallen victim to giant rats but I still sensed the pretty little house beneath. I vaccumed the mouse droppings, straw and dust away, inadvertantly taking some of the wall paper with it. It was hanging off the walls.

I was in a small quandary, pretty certain it was once a Triang number 50 but a pre-1960s one because it had a hardboard roof and the front was hinged. Later models had a plastic roof and the front slid to oneside to allow access. Judging by the paper, sometime during the 1980s it had had a makeover, and as well as floral wall paper and a repaint, stairs and two side windows had been added.

I set about cleaning it up, getting rid of the filth of several decades and repapering. I put in flooring and pretty bright paper and repainted the green base at the front. I still haven't done anything to the front other than clean it a bit and I may just leave it as it is. I kept the rickety bannisters, just gave them a clean up and a repaint and I left the windows as they were. My OH made a simple front door to keep out intruders.

The house is happier now. It has a small family in residence, an impoverished family judging by the few sticks of furniture but at least they love the house, and the house loves them. This one will remain in my collection, I think it wants to stay.