Get miniature furniture ideas from pictures of real furniture.
Making miniature doll furniture appeals to the craft enthusiast who has built a dollhouse or dreams of building a dollhouse. It is a project for an adult or older child. It requires more imagination than building skills. There are a variety of different materials and recyclable items to use when making miniature furniture.
Printable Furniture Projects
Craft books, such as Vivienne Boulton's "The Dollhouse Decorator," include pages of patterns to trace and apply to cardboard or wood. After cutting out the pieces, assemble according to the instructions in the book to make miniature furniture, such as a dressing table, dresser or wingback chair. Instead of using patterns from a book, a number of websites offer free patterns, referred to as printables, to print out from your computer onto heavy paper. Many of these don't just print the outline pattern, but apply design and color to the paper. It's like printing out miniature furniture.
Recycled Furniture Projects
Look around for recyclable material, suitable for making miniature furniture. Empty matchboxes make ideal drawers. Cut out a large rectangular piece of the heavy, clear packaging plastic to make the top of a glass-top table. Fashion a small cardboard box into furniture, such as a dresser or table. Look through magazines for pictures of furniture, and then imagine how you might replicate the piece, using cardboard. Make wrought iron-like doll chairs by artfully cutting and curling aluminum soda cans, using the bottom of the can as the chair's seat, and shaping the cut sections to form chair legs and a backrest. While this is a classic craft project, often called tin can doll furniture, it is not suitable to use as a child's toy, due to the sharp edges.
Embellishing Furniture Projects
Craft clay, which typically sells for about $1 or less per ounce, can be fashioned into furniture parts and then baked in the oven for about 15 minutes to harden. After making furniture, add embellishments such as knobs for drawers. Make drawer pulls from a variety of materials, such as painted dry beans or seeds, pins or needles with decorative heads or jewelry beads. Gold sticker stars, strategically cut, make suitable gold hinges for cardboard cupboards. Glue fringed trim around the base of a fabric couch to add the final touch. Use clear, heavy packaging plastic as see-through windows in china hutches or other cabinets with glass. For china closets with mirror backing, use aluminum foil as the mirror.
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