Shine
I gave all of the siding a coat of satin varnish. This gives the siding a nice soft shine and prevents fingerprints if you touch the walls. Use a spotlight to see where I'm applying the varnish so no areas are missed Do not apply varnish to any areas other than siding, since a shiny dollhouse causes imperfections to stand out. You also don't want to add the varnish before the dollhouse is finished since it can interfere with the glue adhesion and components could fall off in the future.
Shingling
You can find many Victorian shingle patterns online that you can use on your dollhouse. I decided to use alternating rows of square and fishscale shingles.
It is much easier to shingle before adding the dormers. Their installation, afterwards, will not interfere with your shingles. I was so caught up in trying to decide what color scheme I wanted my dormers to be, that I installed them before shingling and paid the price later when I had to cut shingles around them.
I did not create shingle templates for this dollhouse, since the dormers were already installed, so instead I had to apply the shingles directly to the roofs. There are a lot of angles to cut so you can certainly make templates so it's easier.
I did not shingle the backs of the mansard roofs, except for the tower top because you don't want to shingle very narrow areas. It is very difficult to keep the pattern consistent and impossible to cut the shingles too small. They will break and split if you cut them tiny. Adding shingles to small, narrow areas will also cause your shingles to bulk up, losing their crisp details.
The shingle patterns should line up on every roof panel but keep in mind that some panels might have slight deviations, simply because of the way the flat roof sits. These dollhouses are not laser precise so even though it is not noticeable to the naked eye, some roof panels might sit taller than others. When you apply measurement precise shingle rows to them, this variation will become noticeable so just try to keep the patterns consistent but you didn't do anything wrong if you see slight differences. These differences will only be noticeable to you and no one viewing your dollhouse as a whole will be aware of it. In other words, don't stress. If you made it this far in the assembly, you succeeded so don't let shingles bring you down.
Spackle
I have said it before during this assembly and I will end with the same advice, use spackle sparingly. This is hard to do when you're new to dollhouse building but something you learn quickly the more you assemble.
This is not a real house. It is a dollhouse and most small gaps are not noticeable so they don't have to be spackled. Spackle should only be used for very large gaps and for repair work. Adding too much spackle, in small areas of your dollhouse, will create caking. The caking will cause the area to be noticeable. You are actually enhance the problem rather than hide it. Spackle needs to be sanded smooth and you can not sand properly very small, inaccessible areas of the dollhouse.
The only areas that you should spackle on this dollhouse are:
-Corner notches in all corner vertical trim, including the mansard corner trim (even if you are applying thin trim to the notches like I did)
-Edge between the flat roof and horizontal verge board
-Top and bottom of the bay walls, so you can create a sharp corner joint by sanding
-The inside edges of interior door frames
-Any repair work you had to do
Do not apply spackle to your dormers, especially on the interior. Use paint to hide any exposed edges. Your dormers are very small and they are the focal point on this dollhouse, so adding spackle to them will make them loose detail. If you assembled the dollhouse correctly there should not be significant gaps in your dormers.
Never apply spackle to the brackets or the window sills. Adding spackle to these layered parts will cause them to loose detail. Only apply spackle to these parts before lamination, if the wood is crumbling or damaged.
There is no need to add wood filler to the tops of your dormers unless you have a very large gap between the dormer roof and your shingles. Try to be precise with the fit of your shingles so you do not have to hide gaps in this area, since it will be highly noticeable. If you do have to hide gaps, choose a darker shingle color so you can hide the wood filler better.
Always determine if the area in question could benefit from additional trim rather than spackle.
Mishaps
I had to fix several mistakes I made on this dollhouse. One of them was that I accidentally added the wrong top trim to the French Door. I had added one of the dormers top trim to the door so I had to gently chisel the trim off of the French Door, repair the area by filling in with spackle and then sanding it. I then repainted it and added the correct trim to it.
I also had to chisel off the dowel trims in the bay wall joints in order to straighten them. They appeared crooked because I applied them directly to the bay wall joints. Since these dollhouses are not laser perfect, don't guide yourself by the wall joints. You will have to install your dowel trim straight, even if the wall joints aren't. Use spackle to hide any gaps between the walls and the trim.
Back Cover
I cover this topic extensively in this document.
For this dollhouse I installed L channels along the top, right side and bottom foundation.
These channels will act as rails for the acrylic sheet to sit and slide on. Because I had created custom back edge trim, all of the L channels line up. This is why it is very important to keep your acrylic back cover in mind as you assemble the dollhouse. If the back edge trim is not an even thickness on all sides of the dollhouse, your L channels will not line up correctly and the acrylic sheet edge will not sit inside all three channels for a flat and even fit.
Now the acrylic sheet can be slid to the left side and removed when I need to access the interior of the dollhouse. Once your miniatures are in place, you will rarely need to access the interior. Everything can be viewed perfectly, with the sheet in place, because it is clear. With the sheet in place, nothing can go in and nothing can fall out. This is great for dollhouse displays that are around pets or children. This is also useful if you have very expensive miniature displays but still want to show your decorated dollhouse to various visitors, without being paranoid. The sheet keeps hands out and expensive items from being stolen.
For the attic room, I placed a square, dowel trim against the back, inner side of the Victorian roof trim. I painted it dark brown so it would not interfere with the look of this trim and the small holes appear hollow. Placing this trim piece here, creates a channel between it and the top, ceiling edge of the tower room. I placed the acrylic sheet, top edge into this channel and pressed it against the side walls so it sits flat, covering the attic room. The bottom edge of the acrylic sheet is resting on the flat dollhouse roof. The sheet sits firmly in place and does not move.
Creating channels for your acrylic sheet to sit in, is the ideal scenario. You will have to plan ahead and modify your assembly to accommodate this feature but it is well worth the extra work. It gives your dollhouse a nice finished look, as if the acrylic sheet is part of the kit itself and it is a very useful feature to have. It keeps your miniatures clean and safe.
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