Decoupage A Doll's Storage Trunk

Every little girl should own a doll trunk and at the very least, a few nice dolls with clothing to dress
 and redress their dolls with. These kinds of toys promote opportunity for both dramatic play and
 creative sewing/craft projects.

Doll trunks may cost as much as 100 dollars
or as little as 5 dollars.

       Two 11 1/2 inch dolls will fit comfortably inside this little wooden doll trunk. Soon I will fill it with handmade doll clothes and accessories. The drawer is for shoes, the rack for clothing and I will add a shelf for hats later.

Supply List:

• a doll trunk to decoupage
• Mod Podge
• soft brush
• decorative, acid free paper
• wooden dowel
• hot glue gun and hot glue
• ruler or tape measure
• sharp scissors

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Acquire a Doll trunk for this project. I picked this one up at resale for five dollars. It was in excellent condition but cried out for an update. 
2. Make sure the surfaces of your doll trunk are clean and free of dust and dirt before beginning.
3. I decided to leave the slats of my trunk stained on the outside. So I measured and cut decorative paper to fit between these and applied Mod Podge to paste the paper down and then layered several coats of this glue on top of the paper to protect it. You will need to proceed slowly with this process in order to keep your work clean and free from tears. Let each side dry completely before covering the next.
4. Then I measured, cut and pasted the interior of the doll trunk with coordinating papers. 
5. I did not have enough of my paper to cover all of this interior so I decided to use a third coordinating paper on the drawer. 
6. The last step is to glue in a dowel rod for hanging clothing if one is not already in place. Measure the interior carefully, cut the dowel and then use a hot glue gun to position it between the two walls above the drawer. Leave a couple of inches at the top interior of the trunk above the dowel so that there is plenty of room for clothing, hangers etc... to fit in. I chose to be generous with this space because I intend to eventually add an additional shelf for hats.
   

Left, here you can see that I had to glue in a dowel for hanging the doll clothing. This is not unusual,
many doll trunks are sold with only the bare essentials. For centuries, people altered doll trunks and
 even life-sized steamer trunks to accommodate their own needs and tastes. Center, doll trunks are
sold with a smalldrawer located at the bottom of one half of the trunk. Right, this trunk has a clasp,
 but no lock.

 

See how I built a doll crate closet for our 18" dolls here.