More Clues on the VERO

Little by little, I am gathering more clues and information on my VERO house. I saw a house on German eBay this week that looked very similar to my house, and communicated with the seller about it, who dates it to the 1970s. She also sent some additional pictures, which are unfortunately very small.


She wrote: The house looks really like mine ;) wow. It could be clue on the door, what I remember was a plastic glass on it. And after a long time ago we made new wallpaper on the walls, and I drew a pic of a house on the side of the house, but with new color and wallpaper you can renovate the house. I had a lot of fun when I was a child with this house, I just played with it on Christmas time. It's about 1 meters long I think. It was big to me. I´ve really no idea if it´s from "Vero." It looks almost like this from "Moritz Gottschalk." Upstairs I had the kitchen and the living room, and downstairs I had the bathroom and sleeping room.

It's interesting to hear about the door, so it seems very plausible that some plastic was used in the opening to simulate glass. The second floor of my house has a wall of windows, whereas this one does not, and in this way, her house does strongly resemble the Gottschalk house on the Puppenhausmuseum website. The door is very similar, as is the layout, but given the wallpapers and flooring were changed, it is difficult to tell what might be the same.

I felt a bit encouraged by this, but was even more happy to receive a very big clue from Annina, who pointed out this house on eBay now. Wow.


THIS looks like my house! The seller did not have too much to say on it, only that her father bought it for the family in the 70s or earlier, and they have been the only owners. It is apparent to me that the bathroom paper and flooring is not original, nor is the chimney in the same paper. In the listing, the seller states that her father set up an additional room on the roof with lighting, so perhaps that is why this appears here. The other wallpapers, however, offer some interesting clues. I do see some resemblance to my papers, although the flooring looks different.



It is great to see the corner of windows, although my window panes have a different design. And there is a lovely window box under the first floor window, confirming my hunch! The shutters and window frame look identical to mine, and I can see the type of windowpane used. Also, it does look like a terrace with a window is what used to be on the top floor, also verifying my hunch!! This may mean that I try to replicate this simple terrace design.



I was interested to see the pink flowered window drapes in this house, which resemble my blue ones. I did not think mine were original to the house, but perhaps they are! Seeing this door was revealing to me as well, since it looks like an exact match to mine, and there was a panel of glass on the inside -- that is clear in this picture.


Images are from eBay listing.



All in all, it is nice to see such a similar house, although it would be nice to have some verification on the maker and the year. Perhaps my house is from the 1970s, not 60s, and I do wonder about the variations on this particular style of house. This detective hunting has sparked my interest in other vintage German houses, especially the ones I am seeing on eBay. I have been compiling images and information and may put them in a future post.

UPDATE, 12/23/09: The "twin" to my VERO sold for a little over 11 Euros, a lot less than I paid for mine, but it was local pickup only. The other house sold for 30 Euros.

VERO Door and More


After some more vacuuming in and around the VERO house, I came to the front door. It was obviously covered with the same faux wood grain paper as the top rooms, and badly applied at that. Pulling off the sticky paper, I saw the real door emerge...






There is an opening in the middle that was likely covered in acetate or similar material to simulate glass. I assume the door is original -- it resembles the one on the Gottschalk house that I referenced when I originally bought my house.


For the most part, the door is in good condition, but there are stubborn spots of sticky glue on the front and back -- perhaps something decorative used to be applied there? I am not sure how I am going to get it off. I love the door handle, very typical of these houses.




I repaired the window frame to the left of the front door and placed it back. At some point, I may put acetate in there and perhaps put a window box underneath it. It looks like one used to be there.




It also appears as if a terrace or larger window frame was on the top -- not sure if I would do anything on that, not knowing what was really there.



In other news on my house, Annina kindly sent me some high resolution scans of her VERO house wallpapers. Now I need to find the right paper on which to print them. Her papers are lovely:






I may try to scan a good swath of my wallpaper, below. It somewhat resembles the paper in the top left room of this Gottschalk house, although I cannot tell for sure:



Speaking of paper, I quickly played around with some new scrapbook paper and created a corner nursery in the upstairs room. I bought some materials from Blick Art Supplies and set to work with my cutting knife to trim to the right sizes.






I also was able to purchase sheets of an acetate alternative for potential repair of the wall of windows -- that is for another day!!

Gottschalk house photos courtesy of Puppenhausmuseum website.

Credits: Crib is vintage Bodo Hennig; rocking horse and wardrobe are vintage German; rug and whirlygig in corner are AG Minis; table is vintage Lundby; chair is Reac; fabric in back is by Marimekko; accessories are Re-ment, Marx, Lolly's, Nodameggakki, and MAR Toys.