The kitchen quest

While you can find a million very pretty doll house kitchens in 1/12 scale, items in 1/6 are really hard to find. I spent days googling for something, and what I found was disappointing. Of course there are individual artisans on Etsy who produce lovely wooden furniture kits in 1/6 scale, either for self-assembly or ready made, but most of them are not in the EU. And of course there are the furniture sets created for Barbie dolls, but they are designed to attract kids, all of them are plastic and most of them pink.

I would never have guessed that it is so difficult to find a decent looking kitchen for 1/6 dolls. And with decent I mean a kitchen that is not pink plastic – even though I ended up ordering one of those, because that was the only one I found that was actually available – and it was cheap. I could make one myself, but this time I want to give customizing this pink monstrosity a try.

 

 

I have seen quite a few nice make-overs of this plastic Barbie kitchen. But even that one is hard to find in Europe. The Americans are a bit better off, they can just buy the pink/silver “My modern kitchen” version at Walmart. Which is not quite so pink, but still plastic. And even though it is designed for Barbie, the counter height is not quite high enough.

Then there’s a red one, an even cheaper version of the “modern kitchen”, but it looks less customizable and the handles are huge. I found perfect looking Japanese Re-Ment kitchen pictures, but you can’t get them anywhere.

The only European company that offers something that would work with Barbie (if you add to the height) is Maileg. It’s a Danish company, and the furniture is made of painted tin. They are “trending”, and I guess you pay for the brand name. The kitchen is basically just a cooker and sink, and if you buy the fridge and washing machine to make it complete, you can easily spent 300$ for something, that IS adorable and beautifully designed in it’s own way, but not quite as mature looking as I would like, and the scale isn’t exactly right either. They have been designed to match the Maileg Mouse dolls in size.

 

 

After days of searching I have to come to the conclusion that there is no European company that produces (or imports) furniture sets like kitchens, living room furniture and other items in a size that is specifically designed to work with Barbies or other fashion dolls, Blythe, 1/6 BJD and 1/6 action figures. For the most part, Etsy is the only source of stylish and realistic furniture, and since a single artisan can only work at one piece at a time, the offers are limited. And shipping from Russia or the US plus tax can be really expensive.

But the work of Marina & Elena from WoodenTalesWorkshop, Rosa from DollRoomDecors or DreamStudioDollHouse is really beautiful.

Outside of Etsy? A couple of sofas, chairs and tables, most of them designed for action figures, that’s it. You can find them occasionally on Ebay or Amazon – or AliExpress. And you better read the description carefully. A lot are labeled as 1/6, but they turn out to be just 1/12.

And yet there are thousands of adult doll collectors who would love modern, mature looking furniture to photograph their dolls with. Not pink, not plastic, preferably as realistic looking as the many, many items in 1/12 dollhouse scale. Which are easy to find, affordable and arrive within days thanks to quick national shipping.

There are so many popular realistic looking mature dolls in a size around 30cm that it’s somewhat surprising no miniature furniture company seized the opportunity to bring more furniture to the market adult doll collectors would love.

If there was an established doll furniture company who would offer realistic looking wooden furniture kits (maybe even for self-assembly) in 1/6 scale, it would be a god send. And I am pretty sure they’d sell very well.

It would be perfect if the furniture would come as IKEA style DIY kits for self-assembly or even DIY painting, they would be easier to ship as well. But most of all it would be perfect if they were easy to find and readily available. If those wooden furniture cabinets would come with matching retro kitchen fridge fronts, tin sinks and in colors like off white, pastels like pistachio or light grey, I bet a company that produces them could sell A LOT of them.

I contacted a German company that makes beautiful wooden pretend play mini kitchen sets for kids, but I don’t know if anything will come off it. I’ll keep you posted. And of course I will post the progress I make with my endeavors to de-pink the plastic kitchen set.

I think I’ll end up building a 1/6 dollhouse. I don’t have any space for more dioramas, so I have to start to pile the rooms on top of each other.