The dollhouse that I’m renovating had a bunch of different types of flooring in it, and I’m going to be trying out some things to see what works and how to use different materials in it, too.
For this marble floor, I used printable paper that I designed based on vintage marbled paper. It’s available in my Etsy shop, along with some other designs that are similar but in lighter tones.
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How to use paper printables for dollhouse flooring.
Paper printables are a good alternative to painting the floor because they’ll cover up imperfections and bumps as long as the bumps aren’t too large.
Start by getting printable paper that has the right scale and design that you’re looking for. If you have a pattern that’s really large, it might not look right inside your dollhouse.
The paper that I used is in my Etsy shop here: ClayPaperScissors. It’s not technically designed for a dollhouse floor, but the pattern is small enough that it looks fine in my 1:12 scale house. I also have the lighter version of these marbled patterns here: Lighter marbled paper printables.
These are designed to print out on regular letter sized paper, 8.5″ x11″. The pattern isn’t seamless, but it’s varied enough that it isn’t noticeable when you put the edges together.
Next, you’re going to remove the original flooring if you haven’t done that yet.
I was lucky because the flooring that came in this room already had a cardboard template that it was attached to, so I just had to slide it out, then remove the extra printed flooring that had been glued on.
Using a cardboard template to glue your flooring to is an easy way to work in the corners that are in the back of the room.
Since most dollhouses aren’t perfectly square, using a template is the best way to fit the flooring into the room without having to try to cut it out to fit small areas in the back.
I trimmed the edges off of the paper and got it ready to glue onto the template.
This room took three pieces of 8.5″x11″ paper, but it was almost exactly 11″ wide so I didn’t have to trim much off of it once the edges were cut off.
I used regular glue to glue the paper to the template, but you can use double-sided tape if you don’t want it to be totally attached.
I glued the paper onto the floor template, and I wasn’t gentle about it. I probably should have spread the glue out thinner, but I just plopped a bunch of dots of it onto the template and then glued the paper on.
Line the edges up to butt up against each other…Like I said above, this pattern doesn’t line up exactly with itself to repeat the pattern seamlessly, but there’s so much going on with it, it’s not really noticeable.
This is why you should probably spread the glue out thinner than I did…There were a few spots where the paper absorbed moisture from the glue and wrinkled a little because it was thick in that spot.
For this marbled pattern though, it didn’t matter because the pattern disguised it, and I was able to flatten that area out by pressing it to spread the glue out a little.
I used regular printer paper, too, which is thinner and is going to be more likely to wrinkle like that. If you used cardstock to print on, this probably would be as likely to happen.
Turn the template over and trim off any extra paper using regular scissors.
When the floor is ready, slide it back into the dollhouse. Press it into any corners or nooks that need to be a little more fitted, and as long as your template was shaped right it should fit perfectly.
You can use double-sided tape to attach it, or just put the template in then secure the floor by adding baseboards around the edges.
This is the finished floor. If you look really closely you can probably see where the seams are, but the pattern really does hide them.
Remember that if you’re using a repeating pattern like tiles or bricks on the floor, you’ll have to be a little more careful and have extra pieces of the printable paper available to take the repeats into account.
The good thing about using printables is that you’ll be able to print as many as you need, and if you mess something up you can just print out some more to work with!
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