Well, you know all about my Tiny Houses. I’ve made a lot of them and I hope to keep on going. I think my interest in creating these structures comes from several sources. I’ve loved houses, house plans, and architecture since I was young. It was a favorite pastime of my family in childhood to tour houses under construction in our neighborhood, which was being built up during the time I was growing up.

In adulthood my husband and I continued this pastime of viewing sample homes, open houses, and the occasional house-in-process.

Along these lines, I also had several dollhouses in my young days, as well as building small villages outside with my sister and friends with scrap wood, under a shade tree to beat the hot summer days. And there were the boats my dad made for us with scrap wood that we sailed in the creek at the end of our yard…and how about all the little cars and the roads we made for them…and the paper dolls and their homes…

I guess I could go on and on. You may be saying, what does any of this have to do with TODAY?

Well, in the Build a Tiny House session I took back in July, I built houses. And then I thought I’d try some furniture. Here are my first attempts from that time in July.

Armchair!

Bed!

Small Chair!

How did I do these? It’s surprisingly easy. I constructed a basic form using thin (think cereal box) cardboard. It was important to take the time to make sure the form was sturdy and could hold up. For the two chairs, I built the forms from individual scraps; for the bed, I cut down a box to make the basic shape and then added the head and footboards.

Then, using the papier mache skills I learned in the Tiny House class (look here for a description) I covered the framework and built up the forms.

Once they had dried (about 2-3 days) I painted them with acrylics, acrylic markers, and India ink.

Wow! What a lot of fun! I will be making more furniture.

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Here is the armchair in the attic of Tiny House 9.

Here are the bed and chair relaxing together.