Category:Lego Dollhouses

In 1978, Lego decided to "push the boat out", and produce three sets referred to in their literature as LEGO Dolls Houses.

The basic plan of these sets was a half-building, walled on three sides, on a base. ... and with the larger two sets, there were two of these half-buildings on separate bases, with a hinge, so that the two halves could be opened out for play or closed up to give a representation of a single-storey building (without roof). The baseplates were fully studded to allow more flexibility for where one placed interior walls.

Lego set 230: Ladies Hairdressers

A red building with a white upper rim, and signage reading Salon Colette. Open at the back, with a front central door and two side-windows, with window-boxes and striped awnings. Furniture and two figures included.

Built on a single 16×32 (white?) baseplate.

Lego set 231: Hospital

In our opinion the best of the three, a white hospital building in two hinged parts, with multiple doors and windows, and red trim. Lots of internal hospital furniture and wall-stickers, and four figures.

Built on a pair of red baseplates, a rectangular 16×32 baseplate, and a double-size square 32×32 base. The larger size of the bigger plate isn't strictly necessary, but allows space for expansion, if the owner wanted to add further wall extensions. Due to the nature of hospitals, the building lends itself well to both the addition of inside partition walls and extension to cover the whole of the square plate.

Lego set 232: Bungalow

A slightly Simpsonesque yellow building on brown baseplates and with brown top trim.

This is the largest of the three sets, with staggered exterior walls and a partial internal wall. Four main areas, bathrooom/toilet, bedroom, kitchen area and toilet area. Plus an outside table and two chairs.

Built on a pair of brown square 32×32 baseplates.

A missed opportunity

Disappointingly, the building only occupies only slightly over half of the baseplate area, giving two large brown surfaces with nothing to put on them except the table and chairs and a single tree. This is presumably to give lots of extra space for expanding the bungalow with additional walls and rooms, if you have the spare wall-slabs.

But another possibility would have been if Lego had produced a contemporary garden accessories set: Lego already produced flowers and trees by this time, and it would have been perfectly possible for them to produce an "outdoors" accessory pack to go with the set, or to be stand-alone, consisting of more trees, and plants, and flower-beds, and green lawn sections and enough plates to build a path or two, and perhaps a raised pond.

New large structural pieces

The advance from loose sets of furniture with or without a base and with or without a back wall, to full multi-room sets was made viable by the introduction of new wall, window and door pieces. While it's no great hardship to build exterior walls using normal Lego bricks , The new large wall slabs probably reduce the cost of the sets, and if you have extras (not included) they really come into their own – once you've built the main structure as per the manual, using extra wall slabs to put in interior walls, and to be able to move them around quickly on a whim, and experiment, really adds the element of spontaneity that makes Lego different from, say, Meccano.

Unfortunately, owners wouldn't have realised how much fun it is to divide up the rooms unless they bought more pieces.

Wall pieces

A three-by-one wall segment, five standard bricks high.
A six-by-one wall segment, five standard bricks high.

With the addition of six-stud-wide doors and windows, the basic plan of a wall with a central door and two separated windows could be could be 3 +6 +3 +6 +3 +6 +3 , thirty studs wide. With the addition of two one-stud-thick side walls, this came out conveniently as 32 studs, fully filling the width of a 32-stud plate.

Alternatively, with two door or window components, more widely separated, the layout could be 6 +6 +6 +6 +6 , thirty studs wide, and again 32 studs wide with the addition of a couple of sidewalls. The chunks of wall could then be anchored together securely and topped off with normal one-stud-wide bricks and/or strips.

Windows

A six-by-one window segment, five standard bricks high.

A brown window frame, taking a centre-pivoting pane of clear plastic, with a double-slot per window edge, on each side.

Doors

A six-by-one door segment, ten standard bricks high.

A brown door frame, taking a left- or right-hinging red plastic door, with a double-slot top and bottom, and two double-slots per side, on each side.

Accessories

The (new?) slot system on the windows and doors was designed to take more new pieces:

A projecting "awning" piece to go above a window or door
Shutters to go by the sides of a window or door
A low-hanging below-window shelf, with a row of studs suitable for taking plants