A Quick, Easy, Fun, Cheap Foam-board Dollhouse!

This was such a fun, fast project!  We decided to try our hand at creating a different type of doll house made from foamboard.  It is extremely light weight.  It is actually quite sturdy, but probably would not hold up to someone sitting or stepping on the side or back walls.  The decorating was super simple too... we decorated it before putting it together (with the exception of final trims).  We used items on hand... scrapbooking paper (affixed with glue stick), duct tape, and some left over fabric scraps for flooring.  Here are some pictures with extra directions so you get the idea... The possibilities are endless, so have fun creating!

If you are new to our blog, be sure to check out the free printable wallpaper and floorings.  They would work great with these foam dollshouses too!

YOU NEED:
*2 sheets foamboard (dollar store foam board is what we used)
*razor-blade (exacto) knife to cut the foam board
*glue stick
*hot glue
*decorating supplies (duct tape, scrapbooking paper, print-outs, etc.)

Use this as a guide... You can cut each piece out and glue everything separate if you are more comfortable with that.  We chose to use a "scoring" method for some of the cuts as it makes it a bit easier if you only have 2 hands!  If you are uncertain what this means, please comment and I will create a separate post.  

If you would like to cover edges that will be showing after your house is completed, use the above method...

...and trim out the corner so that you can use hot glue to stick down your finished edges.

Hello Kitty duct tape siding!  This is the fastest, most fun, easiest dollhouse siding I've ever done :) Not realistic looking, but that wasn't the aim here.

The walls being raised... notice everything has been predecorated - just stuck everything on with glue stick.  The wall corners were secured with a line of hot glue.

Once you have the entire house frame glued together, lay the  house on the second piece of foamboard and trace the outline.

Here's the outline.  Cut it out using your exacto knife.

Once it's cut out, make sure it fits and trace the interior rooms...

...decorate the back walls of the dollhouse

Here's the completed project, all hot-glued together!

You can add some think duct tape to the edges if you wish, either for looks or if it feels like the glue isn't sticking on the edges.

Note that using a hot glue gun does leave some "light shining through" but nothing major.

We added this purple flower trim (because it was what we had) to cover up the white part of the foam board.

This room is tiny but we wanted to experiment with gluing an interior wall.

Other ideas:

*Cut doors and windows into your foam-board dollhouse...
*Make a 100% duct-tape covered foam dollhouse :)
*Poke holes through the back wall and stick Christmas lights through to light up your foamboard doll house (see our other blog posts for ideas and pictures) 

doll house wall box roof: free printable

Here's a free printable for you in case you want to "roof" your dollhouse wall box...

An idea for a doll house roof...

Ideas for dollhouse roofs are not something I've written about... but here are a couple of ideas for a smooth painted roof:


Paint the roof all one color, use masking tape to tape off part of it in whatever design you want... I chose plain stripes for this house, but you can do a criss-cross pattern or squares, etc.

Another idea is to use foam stamps... paint your roof, daub paint on your foam stamps and press on the house roof.  Here's an example of a whimsical design...