Sister act

Chance took me past the little doll's house museum in the small town of Newport, and I noticed to my surprise that it was open. I've never felt inclined to investigate it before but on a wet cheerless Monday morning I thought I'd give it a go. It's run by these two feisty sisters Pam and Val, seen here with some of the stock including Pam's old bear on wheels, always known as just Big Bear. This is not the only item from the sisters' own childhood and the story of how the collection started is worth telling.

They grew up in Surrey, obviously in a well-heeled family, but in 1939 their father went back to the army (he'd already been gassed in WW1 aged 18). The house was closed up and all their toys were packed away in crates in the attic. Then, somehow (I'm not sure why) the crates remained there after the war was over and didn't come to light again until the house was sold 40 years later - when suddenly all the sisters' childhood toys and dolls emerged just as they had been when packed away. Among them was Val's huge 1930s doll's house, The Gables, decked out in 'stockbroker Tudor' style.  This event set them off collecting doll's houses across the ages, the earliest being from the first half of the 19th century and the latest including miniature computers. The contents of each strictly contemporaneous with the era of the house and therefore provides a visual social history rich in miniaturized domestic detail.

The sisters have holidayed in West Wales since 1937 and moved here permanently a few years ago, buying a small property, Ty Twt, in the main street to display their collection - which includes a variety of old toys in addition to the doll's houses.  I really longed to know more about them: despite being, I imagine, well into their 80s they are  robust and cheerful souls whose knowledge of childhood playthings seems unparalleled despite, it would appear, having no families of their own.

Val's huge stockbroker-belt doll's house (complete with a tiny Daily Telegraph and  packet of Player's Capstan cigarettes on the coffee table and a Daimler in the garage) was probably  close to the reality of the sisters' own childhood. Indeed I was rather shocked when I turned to look at the much smaller house beside it to be told 'That's the servants' house'... It got me thinking how these doll's houses really were the exclusive domain of wealthy children and how poor kids never got their hands on them. The making of the houses and all their intricate furnishings was a complicated time-consuming business which must have put the cost far beyond the means of most families, and the tiny contents replicated the actuality of their lives as a form of ostentation. The class aspect of these show-off toys is beautifully illustrated in a very short but pitch-perfect story by the NZ writer Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) entitled The Doll's House. In it she describes the social condescension and power exhibited by a little girl who excludes, and then controllingly allows (for the briefest moment) two impoverished children to view the marvellous doll's house she has been given. Chillingly, the pariah kids seem entirely satisfied with their fleeting glimpse of a privileged world they know they can never enter.
They had never seen anything like it in their lives. All the rooms were papered. There were pictures on the walls, painted on the paper, with gold frames complete. Red carpet covered all the floors except the kitchen; red plush chairs in the drawing-room, green in the dining-room; tables, beds with real bedclothes, a cradle, a stove, a dresser with tiny plates and one big jug.

The story  can be read in its brief entirety here 

Ty Twt Doll's House Museum