The Essex Dolls House Haul - Part Three

Recovery from the excitement of son's wedding on Sunday is slow but steady - if you are interested you can share the set-up and transformation process of a plebeian scout hut into a magical venue by my daughter here.

Our full-size house (which we have this morning accepted an offer on, a huge wrench, selling after nearly forty years) is full of wedding chaos, everything piled into boxes and bags after stripping down the scout hut on Sunday night to return it to its normal state.   

And I am supposed to be organising a singing workshop on Saturday though thankfully I am not the one who leads it.  (If you live near Hoddesdon, Herts, and love to sing, even if you fear you can't, do check out the link and sign up to join us.)

My brain is still not back in gear, and when that happens the best place to turn is to the totally controllable world of dolls houses, so it's time to take a look at the fourth house of the six from Essex.   You caught a glimpse of it at the end of my last post.

And here it is, with apologies for the foreshortened picture. Those of you who have been following this adventure from the start will recognise the shingled effect!

It is bigger than it appears in the photo, scale of one to twelve, with an opening front and a lift-up roof.   Not sure if the front door opens.   This is a style of house that many collectors start on but I don't yet have one like it in twelfth scale though I have a very similar one, in a smaller scale, tucked away in the garage.

It's not a shape that greatly inspires me so I would be very happy to receive suggestions for what could go into it.   Once again, I don't really want a conventionally furnished house....I have plenty of those.

I have just realised I only took three photos before we added this one to the garage but enough for people to come up with some ideas perhaps. 

Unusually for a dolls house I see there is a staircase up to the loft. Even when a house has a staircase on the lower floors it seems the inhabitants are expected to fly into the loft from outside. Not in this one though so maybe I can capitalise on that...

And the inside is very basic, again foreshortened so the true size is not easy to see.   There is a room divider for the first floor so it could be two rooms though I am inclined to repaper it and make it just one room.   

I had thought about a restaurant downstairs but I do already have a French-style cafe/patisserie so it would have to be another sort of eating place.   Hmm, maybe in contrast to the house itself it should turn into a chippy?

Ah, I have just had a thought - looking at it again has reminded me of the old house in Richmond where the Misses Lee, a pair of elderly sisters,  ran the small school which I attended when I was four.   Something about the dark green leaves behind it brought it to mind - I can remember the huge (well they seemed huge to me) laurel bushes through which we had to pass to reach the front door.

And now I can see the classrooms........

What do people think?   All other ideas still gratefully received as well.   Thank you for staying with me and see you again soon.

Oops - I almost forgot the tantalising glimpse of the next one: