Today, I started working on the gothic window and French door. Since the room is finished inside and I have enough siding outside, it seemed like a good time to tackle this project. Like in my first Beacon Hill, I will be turning this into a window. You need to choose a color for it, and all the window parts must be completely painted before assembly. This includes the front, back, and all edges, even those that might be hidden. It's important that no bare wood shows when you look through the window.
Once the paint dried, I began assembling the frames for the plastic windows. I put together the two sides and the door, using binder clips to hold them in place. I also assembled the exterior trim separately with binder clips. After everything dried, I fitted the three casings—the sides and door—into the opening. Fortunately, they slid in easily without any force or tapping, aligning perfectly with the walls. This is great because this window is a focal point of the dollhouse from the front and needs to look perfect.
Once everything was aligned, I glued the assembled trim over them, ensuring it was even with the casings. I was pleased with how it turned out, and installing this window went smoothly, so I'm optimistic about the rest of the project. I also installed the interior trim.
Next, I worked on the vertical trim, which creates notches or grooves at each corner by design. To smooth out any gaps in these notches, I used spackle until they were nice and smooth. I also spackled the joints of the mansard vertical trim. For a square corner without notches, you can overlap the front trim onto the side trim; I chose this method for my first Beacon Hill.
Returning to the mansard roof, I began adding the horizontal top trim. No matter how well this trim is applied, it often looks rough where it meets the vertical trim. I spackled and painted it but won't worry too much since I plan to add decorative trim over it later. This decorative trim will have small holes that allow you to see through; that's why I'm putting up vertical trim now—to ensure that when you look through those holes, there will be a clean white background instead of gaps behind it. It's essential to install all this trim before shingling.
Once it was dry, I used paper templates I'd made of the mansard roofs to check what needed trimming. I centered them with the window opening and cut off any excess to create perfect templates. Next, I'll transfer these paper templates onto brown paper from grocery bags. After transferring them, I dry-fitted the new patterns to ensure they were accurate—and they were! I painted the bottom edges of these transfers with brown paint. This time, I'm leaving the first row of shingles as octagons instead of turning them upside down for a straight line; this should create a decorative effect with the light brown shingles showing through. I glued them on with hot glue. After that, I stained them with the same stain used on the interior floors and glued everything onto the dollhouse with tacky glue once it dried.
It's important to clamp well around the dormer window openings since I'm shingling before placing those windows on. The shingles won't interfere with these windows because they are mostly assembled away from the mansard roof.
I also shingled the front of the dollhouse and installed trim around the kitchen bay as well as along the back edges of the main walls.
