I stained the staircase and the first floor. I used a gel stain medium from Delta that makes any acrylic paint into stain. This is great because there is a lot of floor area to cover on this dollhouse and traditional stain is really smelly. Using a gel stain medium is convenient if you are working in a non-ventilated area but you can also use gloss acrylic varnish.
After everything was dry, I installed the second floor. This process was not too bad. It goes in pretty well considering how large and awkwardly shaped the floor is.
Once the floor was put in, I was able to put in the kitchen bay wall.
While I waited for all of that to dry, I put the stairwell together. This stairwell must be assembled away from the dollhouse and it must also be completely finished before installed. You will not be able to access it once it is in place.
I primed the kitchen bay wall.
While the kitchen wall dried, I realized that the bathroom/bedroom partition could be put on now since it doesn’t interfere with anything else.
I applied the wallpaper to the kitchen bay wall.
I primed the stairwell.
I prepared the third floor. I painted the ceiling white and drew the wood planks on the floor side.
I stained the second floor and primed the bedroom wall. This wall has to be wallpapered before you can put in the stairwell. It will not be visible or accessible afterwards.
I wallpapered the entire stairwell. I applied the same wallpaper that I will be using for the bedroom. Even though you can't really see this stairwell once the dollhouse is built, you should wallpaper or paint it anyway because when you look in through the windows, this area will be visible.
Once the stairwell and the floor was dry, I glued the stairwell in place.
Everything else can wait and be wallpapered after the third floor is put in.
Putting in the third floor was very difficult. There is no area to use clamps and it is very hard to keep the masking tape in place. The edges of the peaks will cut your masking tape easily. You might want to use several layers of masking tape to make it thick enough so that the edges will not cut through it. Make sure that you dry fit first to ensure that the tabs go which will help hold everything together besides clamping. Have a hammer nearby so you can tap in stubborn tabs.
While all of that dried, I worked on the first floor again. It's time to install the windows down here. The oval windows will soon become inaccessible if you leave them for later. I painted the area around the window openings. I painted the windows. Once it was dry, I sanded and painted around the windows again.
I installed the windows and kitchen door trim.
The time has come to put up the final wall. The back wall. This was extremely difficult to do. I don’t know exactly why it was so hard but it was. I suppose it is the final alignment process in the whole dollhouse structure. Try to clamp with any tool available. When you clamp one side, the other side will pop out and etc. Just continue clamping until everything is held in place.
