The thing I like best about assembling the Rosedale is that you can basically finish the entire dollhouse without touching the roof section. It helps you take a break between working on the interior and the exterior parts of the dollhouse.
I assembled the mansard roof panels. This mansard roof is not the curved style but the slanted style. I think it's a nice addition to the Greenleaf Dollhouse line since they offer both styles of mansard roof lines. The nice thing about this particular mansard roof is that it is very easy to create shingle designs on it.
The panels fit perfectly together so you will not have a difficult time assembling them. They interlock smoothly with minimal effort. I will not install the top roof yet. I need a lot of accessibility in order to apply the flooring and wallpaper because of the unique angles of this room and the attic trap door. Make sure that you go around every joint with wood glue just like with the rest of the dollhouse.
This attic is going to be quite challenging. The angles of the walls makes wallpapering a little difficult since you will have to wrap it around the corners and they are slanted, making the ability to wrap a little difficult.
I also have some very unique wallpaper to apply to this entire attic. It has borders both on the top and the bottom. We all know that the walls of a dollhouse are not the same height as the wallpaper so it has to be cut.
In order to save both the top and bottom borders, your going to have to patch your wallpaper back together after you cut it to the correct height. I suggest you cut the top border off and not the bottom one. The patch will be less visible if the patched edge is facing down towards the floor rather than up towards the ceilings.
The next challenge is the flooring and baseboards. If you have a border on the bottom of your wallpaper, unless the manufacturer left a white edge under the print to allow area for the baseboards, you will have to make it yourself or the baseboards and flooring will cover the bottom border pattern.
The way I'm going to do it is by applying the flooring first in this particular room. That way I can better measure how much leeway I should give the bottom border for the pattern to not be covered by the baseboards.
Next challenge is the attic trap door. It should be flush with your attic floor not the bedroom ceiling. There will be a slight indentation in the bedroom ceiling where this door will be so make sure you painted all of the edges of the door opening the same color as your ceiling.
I painted the trap door white and I found little pulls for it.
Make sure you prime the floors and walls.
I installed the flooring in the attic first and then the attic trap door. Make sure that you have finished it before installation. Remember, its flush with the floor but indented in the ceiling side.
I then installed the top roof. The wallpaper has to be applied after the roof is installed so you can better position it around the ceiling area. This roof is not that difficult to put in but you will need a mallet to tap in some tabs. Clamp the roof down with masking tape and then turn your dollhouse upside down.
Whenever it's possible, you should always turn your dollhouse upside down for painting ceilings and getting to other hard to reach places you usually don't see well when the dollhouse is right side up.
I went over all of the roof joints with rood glue and let it dry overnight.
In the morning, I was able to begin touch ups with the dollhouse upside down. Now I can see many places that need touch up paint and spackle. You might also see some areas in the siding that will need painting as well.
I went ahead and painted the roof eaves white. This is where the brackets will go later on. I also painted the interior ceiling.
I painted the exterior roof brown. The only reason you will want to paint your exterior roof before you apply shingles to it is so that no raw wood areas show through between your shingles. Paint the roof a similar color to your shingles so it blends in nicely.
Let the dollhouse dry.
