KIT REVIEW appearing in Dollhouse Miniatures magazine
February, 1998

Blanket Chest d. Anne Ruff

Take a close look at the blanket chest in the photo. I'll bet you think it's made of wood, right? Wrong! It's made of painted, heavy cardboard.

The kit contains die-cut, heavy card-board parts for the chest and divider tray, wallpaper, hardware (knobs, handles, key plate and key), paper for hinges, sticky paper for joining pieces and a wood-slat smoothing tool. The 16 pages of illustrated instructions include a numbered parts guide and a color photograph showing the chest painted in four different color schemes. You need to sup-ply white glue, scissors, craft paint, two l-inch-wide foam brushes, wax paper, a piece of brown paper from a bag, a damp cloth or sponge and small containers for water and paint. An X-Acto knife is optional. In place of white glue I chose to use Aleene's Tacky glue for everything except the wallpaper lining, for which I used Elmer's School Blue Gel.

I worked through the steps in the recommended order, and even used the little check boxes supplied next to each step to keep track of my progress. All the parts fit together perfectly, and the sketches and diagrams are so thorough as to leave nothing to the imagination. One of the beautiful things about working with the heavy "paper board" is that it takes the several coats of water based paint beautifully without the problem of raised wood grain. Installing the hard-ware was a little tricky, so I enlarged the holes just a little bit with a pin vise.

I am proud of the way the chest turned out and feel it is a professional-looking piece of furniture. It took six hours for me to complete the chest, not counting short drying periods for the glue and paint. The superb instructions and well fitting parts make this kit suit-able for all skill levels.

~Reviewed by Jeanette Zanio

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