Further basement development

I have now let the two kitchens in the basement change place. The working kitchen is now on the right, with a door leading into the larder. I took the old wallpaper from the Victorian kitchen just to see whether it would fit. I think it does. It is of course worn out, but it is easy to make new, with splash technique. So this is it.

I have decided that the lower hall will be mostly delivery, so it doesn't have to be splendid, like the main entrance. I haven't decided on floors and wallpaper yet. I think the floor will be dark tiles. What I have tested is to put in a fake staircase in the rear corridor. There is no staircase from the basement into the main house, because the basement is sold separately, and not everyone may want to invest in a basement. There is no way I can cut a stairwell, but I can make a fake staircase pretending to lead to the ground floor rear corridor. These corridors swallow a lot a space, but they also create a sense of other, non-existent, hidden space.

The vegetable crates are borrowed from my market stand. Victorians weren't keen on vegetables, but maybe my dollhouse family is an exception. This is very preliminary; at this stage it is easy to change my mind.

But my real challenge today was the larder. I like the idea, but the space is weird. At first, I put in the rest of the flagstone floor from the kitchen. It looked good, but the trouble with flagstone floors is that they are thick and uneven. It doesn't matter in a larger room, but in a small room where every millimetre counts it became impossible. As I was looking for something to make fake paper flagstones I found a printout of green tiles. By cerendipity, the sheet fit the room precisely. With such a colourful floor I decided that the walls should be plain white (walls were likely to be whitewashed in a larder anyway). I took out the three walls and painted them, then put them back.I admit that it looks very strange. Mind, I didn't build it this way! 

 

But when I made some shelves it started to look better. In fact I think it will be a very interesting room to display the numerous food items I have. The old kitchen was crammed, and the individual objects could not be properly viewed. I will make more shelves higher up on the walls.

 

At the moment the shelf unit is drying and not to be disturbed. I made it from balsa, supported by a couple of harder craft sticks.

 

I will age the shelves either with tea or with diluted watercolour.  I will eventually glue them to the walls.