The following photos were submitted to a contest for playhouses built by fathers in 1908. Included below are also the winning floor plans for the first prize winner and descriptions of how the charming structures were built from recycled materials.
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| A child's playhouse built from an old piano crate. |
This is the second-prize playhouse built almost entirely from a baby-grand piano box at minimal cost, not including labor. For a foundation the box was placed on five brick piers, each nine inches high. The lid was raised for a ceiling and supported at the inside corners by two-by-four-inch pieces. Above the piano box the gables are of narrow ceiling lumber, and the roof is of rough lumber covered with roofing paper. There is one room inside six feet by seven foot, and the ceiling is five ft. high. The porch measures three ft. two inches by seven ft. Boards painted red hide the foundation piers, and the rest of the house has two coats of white paint. The little girls on the porch live in Iowa and spend many happy hours in this playhouse.
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| This playhouse comes with real wooden logs and a chimney! |
A little girl in Kentucky was the proud possessor of this pretty log-cabin playhouse. Both the house and chimney were built of unbarked willow logs spiked together at the corners; the chimney was lined with firebrick. There was one room, seven ft. by nine, and the height measured five ft. The walls inside were ceiled with five-eigths-inch pine. An old-fashioned fireplace and mantle, just like the "grown-ups" have, made the room snug and homelike. The door was a wooden latch which was "always out" to all the children of the neighborhood who are well-behaved. This cabin was called by it's little owner "a Daniel Boone cabin," but it seems hardly likely that Daniel Boone ever lived in anything quite as nice as this.
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| A little girl plays outdoors with her dolls and house in 1908. There are little doll chairs at the front door. |
This six-year-old Ohio girl was such a fine little housekeeper because her playhouse was always neat and clean for visitors. Originally the house was just a large box in which printing paper had been packed. A carpenter was hired and in a very short time he transformed the box into a perfect little house. All he did was put on a shingle roof, cut two windows, a door and cover the joints with strips of wood to make the floor. The dimensions are: six ft. tall walls and the length and width of the whole playhouse are four ft.
Number 4., just right, was the first-prize winner of the child's playhouse competition. It was owned by a little girl in Minnesota city. Some of her friends may have recognized her standing on the porch with her family of dolls. The house was originally an old woodshed restored into something for a child to play inside. All of this restoration was done by her father who used scrap lumber found inside of his studio.
The photo of the interior shows the living room looking toward the dining room and kitchen. The mantel is built of old crating and ten ft. of new moulding; the carving above is a scrap of ornamental steel ceiling plate; and the pilasters are made from a table-leg sawed length-wise. The combination grate and cook-stove consists of a grotesque ceiling plate, on the living room side, which was outlined to fit this space and cut through the teeth for draft openings. This was bolted to the open side of a large tin cracker box, in the top of which two holes were cut - one for a small stove-pipe and the other for a six-inch stove-lid through which the pretend "fire" was fed. The mantel being nailed against the one-inch partition naturally brought the fire-box in the kitchen, making the cutest cook-stove imaginable. Over the rough boards of the inside old carpet-paper was tacked, which provided a smooth surface for the wallpaper. In the words of the little owner of this playhouse "it is so nice to have a real stove to cook on and a real floor to scrub."
The order of awards for the contest:
- Number (4.) first place prize. Comes with a floor plan.
- Number (1.) the piano box transformed, second place prize.
- Number (6.) the playhouse from the city of Illinois, third place prize.
- Number (2.) cabin from Kentucky, fourth place prize.
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| Swings attached to the outer roof of the children's playhouse in Canada. |
Away up in Canada, on the plains of Northern Alberta, was this playhouse built entirely of logs and covered with a sod roof. The back measured 12 ft long, and each end was seven ft. wide, the front wing six ft. by seven. Inside there was one large room that was divided into a dining space, sitting room and kitchen. From the four little owners of this playhouse came a cordial invitation, "Just call on us and we will make you a cup of black tea, served with Canadian biscuits which we call 'crackers!'
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| The playhouse above submitted from the city of Illinois won third prize! The alcove and porch roof were built using dry-goods boxes. The windows were of inexpensive picture frames. |
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| This submission was called the "butternut cottage." This was because it was shaded by a butternut tree that kept it cool in summer. There was a garden for the children to maintain outside next to the playhouse. It was owned by a family from Pennsylvania. |
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| Another couple of small mistresses from Pennsylvania submitted a playhouse known as the Teddy Bear house. It came with a quaint front porch perfect for tea parties. |
An amazing Aunt transforms her old shed into a playhouse.
