This is the Sid Cooke twelfth scale doll’s house shop that I am making (this image is from their website):
I got this for Christmas a while back – I had been thinking of getting a second doll’s house, and a miniature shop appealed to me, especially as I fancied having one where I could indulge my love of little toys. It’s called ‘Number 1, High Street’, and measures 18 inches wide.
But I got the kit rather than the assembled version – partly because I could customise it as I went. This is how it looked, straight out of the box:
Oo-er!! Bit of a shock, to be honest, as I had never assembled a kit house before, and I was surprised by how many bits there were!
Still, with a bit of help (OK, a LOT of help!) from my husband, who is not DIY-challenged like I am, we got the basic shell assembled. The kit comes as two parts – you could buy just the downstairs shop part, as a stand-alone room box, or the upstairs part as well, to make a more realistic-looking building, which is what I chose. This is the simpler-to-assemble upstairs part, with the parts set out on my desk:
The two halves are glued together at the appropriate time. This is the upstairs part taped together to see how it would look:
It has a chimney that is glued on last. The windows are plastic, and can be painted. They fit really well, and, although non-opening, look really good.
First, though, I thought it would be a good idea to have a dry-run of the whole thing. The front bay windows were quite tricky to hold together with masking tape to try this out, but it was worth doing, to see the whole thing as one piece. All the parts fitted together very well, with no bits left over, so that was a relief 🙂
This was the point where I started to get excited, because it was beginning to actually look like a miniature shop! There were still trims to be added to the frontage, but I’d tried out enough of the assembly to feel confident enough to ‘go for it’.
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Janet Granger's Blog 
Like you I always do a dry fit before assembling a kit, it gives you a good ‘feel’ for how it all goes together. This is a lovely shop, I look forward to seeing it progress and how you fill iit.
This is really cool!
what glue do you recommend for installing the windows? My shell is together waiting for the windows.
Lynne
I’ll be covering what type of glue to use in a later blog post, but for now – if they’re plastic, then clear contact adhesive is a good choice. Use it sparingly!
Mine are wood. I’ll watch for your blog.
Lynne
Well done Janet! I have a shop kit that’s been sitting unopened in its box in the attic for over 20 years! We are moving to a bigger place this year so, you have given me the inspiration to tackle this project then 🙂
Where can I purchase this exact kit?
Hi Theresa, The Sid Cooke collection of house and shop kits was sold as a business to Maple Street Miniatures a couple of years ago – they are re-vamping the range (instructions were a bit brief before), and will put them back on sale when each kit is ready – however, I spoke to them in the autumn of 2016, and they said that the shop kits (as opposed to the house kits) were not a priority yet, as they didn’t expect to sell as many of the shops). So, maybe contact them to ask them to get a move on! http://maplestreet.co.uk/dolls-house-kits-cooke-dolls-house-kits-c-1_73.html
Hello Janet! Thank you so much for replying back to me~ Just today I received this email :
Hello,
Thank you for your email.
Unfortunately this is not one of the Sid Cooke houses that we
produce and we do not know where one can be purchased from.
Sorry we could not be of more help.
Kind Regards,
Bev at Maple Street.
So it looks like I will not be getting this particuliar shop/house! I really wanted it too!
Theresa
That’s a real pity – they assured me a year ago that they’d eventually be bringing back ALL of the Sid Cooke house and shop kits – they used to be really popular when Sid Cooke sold them himself. Then he retired (or died, I’m not sure), and the business was bought by a couple who carried it on for a few years, but they changed the designs a bit and substituted MDF for some of the plywood pieces, for stability. Maple Street told me a year ago that they were going to upgrade all the components and bring them back into stock as kits. If they’re not, then I wonder if someone else would buy the plans off them and re-introduce them, or start selling something very similar. Seems some people don’t have very good business sense….
Perhaps if you contacted an independent doll’s house maker and showed them the image of the shop, they could make one for you?
http://maplestreet.co.uk/cooke-cooke-empire-stores-dolls-house-p-736.html
Looks like they only carry the large shop/house
Yes that would be nice! do you have any photos of your completed shop/house that shows the back side? Is it my understanding that the top unit actually lifts off? Are there any stairs leading to upstairs?
No, sorry, I haven’t taken pictures of the back. The top floor was sold as a separate unit from the shop base, so it just sits on top of the base, flush at the back. I glued it to the lower floor, to make it more stable, then put the brick slips all over the outside so that it becomes just one whole building, and looks a lot more solid. You could have it with the upper floor lifting off completely if you wanted to. The upper front, and the lower front, lift off separately. There are no stairs in it. You could add them, but it’s not a large building, and I felt it would take up too much space to add stairs. You could put a false door at the back on each floor to give the impression of possible stairs elsewhere, that can’t be seen!