German Snow Baby House

German Snow Baby House by Linda Hales

I finished this replica of a German Snow Baby House this morning.  What an all-consuming joy it has been to make this.  I saw an antique one on Pinterest over Thanksgiving and absolutely had to make one for Swiss Days and have been working on it non-stop since Thanksgiving.  I love all antique Christmas items and some of the best ones come from Germany as they were the first country to decorate for Christmas much like we do today.  Doll Houses in Europe are called Baby Houses and this is a snow baby house because it is covered with cotton snow inside and out and shimmers with mica and German glass glitter.  Let me show you what the original looks like for comparison.

As I studied this image I knew I needed some composition animals, a sleigh, lots of vintage and antique millenary, tinsel, ornaments, trees, scrap (antique Victorian images), and dolls.  The dolls seemed to be the hard part as 19th c. dolls cost hundreds of dollars.  After researching my options, I stumbled upon doll heads for sale from a man in Germany who excavates them outside old doll factories.  He had doll heads and broken dolls from 1860 through the 1930s.  He even had snow babies excavated from outside the Hertwig & Co doll factory in Germany. These dolls were tossed into a pit because of imperfections.  Some were painted and some were just bisque.  The sweet expressions on the faces captured my heart.  I knew I could make them into something resembling Heubach spun-cotton ornaments.  I ordered some dolls and lengths of cotton used by spinners and tried to make one.  Some wire, bottles of glue, German glass glitter, cotton batting, cardboard, gesso, paint, cotton pipe cleaners, and Dresden buttons turned into an authentic-looking 1900 porcelain-headed spun-cotton doll.

Here are four of the five spun cotton dolls in the Snow Baby House.  I made the doll heads into a skier, skater, sledder, snow ball thrower, and a lovely lady on a swing. 

One of my other favorite items are the two antique German snow babies.  You can see one in the image above half-way up the stairs.  The other is outside the fence making a snow man in the first photo.  Another favorite item is the Bliss sleigh.  I crafted it from a photocopy of the original sleigh.  This is smaller than the original, which is highly collectible.  I have always wanted a Bliss dollhouse as I love old lithograph images and collect children books from the Victorian times to the 1940s.  The glass ornaments and feather tree garland come from my vintage Christmas collection.  The plaster and composition animals are from Germany and Italy.  The German erzgebirge house is taken from my husband's childhood toys (thanks honey).  There are four reproduction candy boxes that I have filled with toys, tinsel, millinery items, and ornaments.  Here's some more images to peruse.

The bottle brush tree with spun cotton fruit on the sideboard in the back right corner is vintage 1950 and as found.  The enamel clock face next to the door is from my collection of French enamel clock faces (I use them in my jewelry and to decorate my Christmas tree).  The little penny doll in the sleigh is excavated from the Limbach Porzellanfabrik in Germany ca. 1890.  The frozen Charlotte doll next to the fence is from Japan (the only non-European item, but doesn't she match the house?)

I love German Putz animals and would love to have a large Putz under my feather tree, but my Italian nativity diorama with 12 large scenes trumps it every year.

Here's the fifth spun cotton doll on a swing.  Don't you love the spun glass rosette with vintage scrap angel?

I changed a couple of important things from the original.  Lights and Texture!  The lights are from an LED string that turns on via a button in the back next to the front door.  The roof is textured cotton shingles instead of flat cotton snow.  I custom mixed the paint and gesso and painted the house four times to get the color just right;  not too bright or dark, not too green, not too blue.  The walls are textured with gesso as well, imitating the alpine stucco homes.

I've been struggling with what to price this at.  The original was several thousand dollars at auction.  Each item is expensive to purchase separately.  Today, after I finished I found two for sale at Fortnum and Mason's in London.  I don't know why they didn't come up in my search before and was surprised at some of the similarities.  Here's what F&M has:

I am assuming that theirs is a new item copied from the originals like mine.  The one on the left is priced at 2,700 pounds which is $4,500.  I would like to sell mine for $1000.  I will make a total of four snow baby houses over the next two years.  If someone wants a color other than the aqua (like pink, red, or off white) let me know.  I am willing to sell one before Swiss Days but need to bring the second one (to be made later this year) to the show.