Triang Number 76 - our first restoration

 Sometimes I get fed up with routine. I write historical fiction and need a release from that and have various hobbies which include sewing historical clothing, crochet, gardening. I never seem to have enough time for them and you’d probably be right in thinking the last thing I needed was another one. However, I recently spotted an almost antique Triang dolls house and it triggered something dormant in my mind. 

My dad made me a lovely modern 1960s style bungalow when I was little, which was probably just as splendid a pad as a little girl really needs but I’d always cast slightly envious looks at the houses my friends owned. One of my friends had one with electric lighting and a radio that worked. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I mentioned said longing to my old fella and he said, ‘Why don’t you buy one then?’

So I bought nine ... so far.

Number 76 cost the princely sum of £65 and is in ‘original’ condition. We intend to  keep all the houses as close to authentic as we can – the historian in me demands that I respect its origins. As you can see from the photograph, the roof has suffered the most but my old fella was confident he could repair it. (see before and after photo below).

Internally, the wall paper is original and unspoiled, the floor has parquet and brick paper that requires a bit of gentle cleaning. There is one window pane missing and a few pieces of the fretwork need replacing, and a new chimney as it originally had two. I can look out for spare window parts on line and get my old fella to make a replica chimney.

Since we knew next to nothing about dolls house restoration but have done up a fair few real houses, I embarked on a research programme. My word, I never imagined there was so much to learn or that there were so many different Triang models! I am reliably informed that this is number 76. The 1957 catalogue describes it as follows:

‘A fine house with a hinged front for access to the two large rooms. Curtains fitted to opening metal framed windows. Sun-porch and seat with tiled floor. Complete with built-in garage fitted with opening doors. Red tiled roof.’

Further online research suggests the house dates between the late 1940s and the early 1950s. The green and white windows and stained wood garage doors places it as a post-WWII model, the windows suggesting a date after c1947/48.

So the old fella and I are having great fun, cleaning, repairing and reassembling. The roof fixed up amazingly well and I touched up the new tape on the gable with almost the same shade of dark tile red. Thankfully I was able to keep the original floral decoration on the front gable. We’ve had so much fun that we moved on to repair a beaten up number 50 which I resold to a lovely new home. We now have several houses in want of TLC so we will be kept busy over the coming winter, that’s for sure! 

In the next blog I will talk about the restoration of number 61.