The Queen's Dolls' House: Revised and Updated Edition

Book excerpt: A new edition of Lucinda Lambton's guided tour of The Queen Mary's Doll's House. From simple one-room cottages to multilevel castles, dollhouses have long been treasured by children and adults alike. In an ever-expanding array of sizes and styles, they may be closely modeled on reality or wildly whimsical. Few, however, approach the splendor of the royal dollhouse on display at Windsor Castle. With running water, electricity, two working elevators, and many other delights, there can be no question that this is a dollhouse fit for a queen. This lavishly illustrated volume offers a detailed history of the creation, decoration, and furnishing of this extraordinary dollhouse. Commissioned in the 1920s for Queen Mary and designed by renowned architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, the house is a perfect scale replica of an Edwardian residence, complete in every detail. Its library boasts original works by the likes of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Thomas Hardy, and Edith Wharton. Its wine cellar is replete with tiny bottles containing thimblefuls of real vintage wine. And, naturally, its tiny residents eschew pink convertibles in favor of the fleet of elegant Rolls Royce limousines housed in the miniature garage. These and hundreds of other charming features are lovingly detailed in color, with extensive use of material from the royal archives, detailing for the first time the contributions of the artists, craftspeople, and donors involved in its creation. This new edition of The Queen's Dolls' House has been completely revised and redesigned, to feature new photography and text that has been updated to include discoveries made following the recent conservation of the Dolls' House. In this book, Lucinda Lambton, the well-known broadcaster and architectural historian, guides the reader on an imaginative tour of this most magical of residences, and her narrative is complemented by documents from the Royal Archives, including previously unpublished letters between Queen Mary and Lutyens and the many contributing artists and manufacturers.