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Lost trying to build orchid


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Hi everyone. I’m trying to build the Orchid. I can’t seem to understand the instructions that came with the kit. Can’t figure out navigating this site either. 

Help please I’m lost. I’ve punched out & primed the first few pieces. Is there an extended instruction sheet on here that I can’t seem to find. I am also not going to use hot glue that the kit recommends. Should I use quick grip or tie bond wood glue?  Thanks so much for your help.   Marcy. 

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Don't feel alone, Marcy.  This site gets "updated" frequently and we all have to get used to snags in navigating.  I use Tite Bond for wood and regular clear-drying Elmer's all-purpose white glue for the clear acetate door and window inserts.  I always recommend investing in rolls of masking or painter's tape (the blue tape) and dry fit your kit parts together.  Not only does it help you understand the instructions, but you can sand and whittle the tabs & slots to get the kit parts to fit perfectly.  I also trace along the corners where edges abut and mask off anything I will want to glue together.  I have much better success gluing bare wood to bare wood.

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Orchid is a good starting house.  I have done 3 ( I think).  Just read and do each step as written.  Don't jump ahead or ( as in my case) you can get confused.  I usually read it once away from the house, then go back and read again as I build.  (Having said that, halfway through a build, I wing it, because I tend to change a house mid-build. Lol)  dry fit, dry fit, dry fit.  That's where the painter's tape is necessary.  Make sure you mark pieces before removing from sheets.   I mark on the inside, especially window and trim.  I paint trim pieces before gluing on house.  I don't have the steadyest hands. 

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Hi,

Orchid was my first kit too. I survived, you can too! This blog helped a lot. http://moreminis.blogspot.com

You have to have a facebook acct. to be able to view the builds, but it was very helpful.

Also, I downloaded an enhanced instruction sheet from this site. http://www.greenleafdollhouses.com/forum/?app=downloads&module=downloads&controller=browse

Look for orchid instructions by miniman

 

Bonne chance!

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Several years ago some of the instructions were rewritten to be clearer and the Orchid may have been one of them, I'm not 100% sure. Take a look at this and see if it's different than what you have: http://www.corona-concepts.com/instructions/Orchid-Doll-House-Instructions.pdf

The Orchid was the first dollhouse I built and I learned from it that it's okay to deviate from the instructions! Sometimes you can see a better way to do something. The most important step is to dry fit the house first -- put the shell together temporarily with masking tape to get an idea of which pieces fit where and what order you need to do things in.

Here are my blog posts from when I built the Orchid, they're not incredibly detailed but maybe they'll be helpful to you: http://www.emilymorganti.com/blog/?tag=corona-concepts-orchid

(They're in chronological order with the most recent at the top, so start at the bottom with the October Update to see it from the beginning.)

This is a good link to check out when you get to the point of installing the double hung windows: http://www.greenleafdollhouses.com/dollhouse_news/AUG2008/Dollhouse-Windows.html

Some of the other Orchid blogs I know of seem not to be online anymore, but this is a common first house and people ask a lot of questions about it here, so if you search the forum when you have a question you might find that it's already been asked and answered. If not, just ask and we will be happy to help you if we can! You can also search the Gallery for Orchid images to get ideas from what other people have done.

About the glue -- I use a ton of wood glue. As long as the joints will be covered up with flooring, wallpaper, trim, etc. it's fine to glop in a lot of glue and that's how I do it. (Although, I don't think I was so bold with the glue when I built the Orchid, so this probably isn't reflected in my blog posts about the Orchid.) Everyone has their own preference.

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I'm horrible at understanding directions so I treat each dollhouse as a puzzle.  I do lots of dry-fitting and taping to make sure the pieces are correctly placed before I glue.  I will say that I have built/bashed two Orchids, and I do find it to be more challenging than it appears.  As Emily mentioned, make sure you know what you're doing with the windows before you install them.  I had already stuccoed the outside with a paint-sand mix and had wallpapered the inside when I started the windows.  It was not fun sanding/removing & painting over wallpaper to make the windows look correct when I installed them.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Little update. I’m mostly done prepping. Hit a little snag. Finished gluing windows in then realized I hadn’t traced out the walls for wallpaper yet. Ugh! Spent most of my time today tracing out walls with windows & doors cut out. Progress is made. I’ve dry fit the main body structure. Mostly fits as is. Yippee. As soon as it looks a bit more like a house I’ll post some pictures. Right now All I have is parts. 

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The Orchid was also my first build. Take your time. Mark each piece in pencil with top/bottom/left/right/in/out. Dry fit everything before you glue anything together. I know the instructions say to glue in windows early on in the build, but I didn't install windows until the very end, so keep in mind how you plan to finish it first.

When I first read dollhouse instructions for any house, it's like they're written in a foreign language. I have to re-read them many times before it actually makes sense to me, so I just keep them handy with a pencil, and make any notations on the instructions as I figure them out. 

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1 hour ago, stickyfingers said:

The Orchid was also my first build. Take your time. Mark each piece in pencil with top/bottom/left/right/in/out. Dry fit everything before you glue anything together. I know the instructions say to glue in windows early on in the build, but I didn't install windows until the very end, so keep in mind how you plan to finish it first.

When I first read dollhouse instructions for any house, it's like they're written in a foreign language. I have to re-read them many times before it actually makes sense to me, so I just keep them handy with a pencil, and make any notations on the instructions as I figure them out. 

And that is why we do the dry fit, often more than once!

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