I first changed the color of the roofing to a more realistic gray. It contrasts nicely with the rest of the scheme. I didn't want to change the overall scheme too much because then it would make it more obvious that the dollhouse was painted after assembly and twice. For this reason, I matched the original color scheme as closely as I could. It was a nice scheme, so keeping it was not an issue. I recommend you keep the original scheme of a rahab dollhouse whenever possible, unless it is one that is truly unpleasant to live with.
I chose a green that was nearly identical to the original and also a similar blue. I chose acrylic, flat paint. The previous paint was done with gloss paint and this showcases all of the imperfections of a dollhouse, so always use flat paint.
Repainting this dollhouse was not difficult, but of course it is always better to do this before assembly. You will need different size paint brushes to do this properly. Start with the walls and then move on to the components and trim. It will take a lot of touch ups in order for it to look correct and a lot of patience.
If you have sconces and roof flashing like this dollhouse does, you can touch them up using a metallic permanent marker. It works perfectly for these types of touch ups. I did not want to remove the porch sconces because they are cute and their removal would have caused extensive damage to the front wall. Now that they have been touched up with a gold permanent marker, they look good as new. I touched up the porch roof flashing with a silver permanent marker. Do not try and use metallic paints for these parts. It will not adhere properly and can peel off with time. It will also cause a thick coating on the surface of these objects which takes away from their detail and "metal" look.
I decided to give the dollhouse more contrast by adding white to the windows and front door accents. These had been painted all one color before.
I fixed the broken porch railing. It was installed incorrectly and so I had to camouflage that by adding strip wood to the top hand rails, in order to make them straight. I then filled in the side gaps with spackling compound. It was the easiest way to fix the railings without having to spend a lot of money replacing them in their entirety. I gave them a coat of flat white paint. With the new paint coat, all of the mistakes that they made with these railings are mostly hidden.
Several mistakes were made in the finishing of the porch railings. As I mentioned before, they used gloss paint, which is not the appropriate paint for dollhouses. It dried thickly on these delicate, small parts and the shine made this even more obvious.
They also used some kind of wood putty to fill in the "rails" between the posts. This is 100% unnecessary and only someone inexperienced with dollhouses would do this. Also, the putty used is inappropriate to use for dollhouses. It dries hard like plastic and can not be sanded. Basically there are gobs of putty between all of the posts of this porch railing. Luckily the new flat paint, hides most of it. Keep these mistakes in mind when assembling your dollhouse, so you don't make them too.
I removed the faulty electrical box and covered the hole of the foundation with a round furniture felt pad that happened to be the identical size needed.
