ABOUT US

We are Sarah and Nick, and we live in the outer suburbs of London. Sarah, who has a habit of cataloguing anything that stands still for long enough, is the one who maintains this site (hello!). I had a dolls’ house when I was a little girl, and remember going to Miniatura at the NEC in Birmingham with my parents when I was nine or ten, back in the mid-1990s. I remember being stunned by the beautiful things on display, but we were firmly focused on entry-level items suitable for play. That childhood dolls’ house is now with us here in London and has starter-level furniture, a family of standard-issue dolls, and beautiful food made from Fimo by my mum. Nick and I have just had a little girl, and are looking forward to passing that play house (which originally belonged to my aunt) down to a new generation.

But Quartermaine Hall is going to be a different kettle of fish. This will be a dolls’ house that is firmly for grown-ups. We don’t yet have the house itself, but I have grand ambitions that involve building our own from a kit (one day, when we have more time and more room). We both spent our childhoods going to National Trust houses, and it’s still a favourite way of spending a day out, so we have plenty of inspiration. As we both work in the public sector, we’ll never be able to afford this kind of interior decoration or furniture for ourselves, so the plan is to make do by creating something fabulous in 1:12 scale. Initial plans are that Quartermaine Hall will be Palladian in origin, but we’ll be seeing it in its late Victorian form, around 1890. That way, we have a wider spread of objects that we can include in the collection.

And yet, as I said, we lack both time and room at the moment. So we’re starting off by building a collection of miniatures – the Quartermaine Collection. One day, these pieces will help to decorate the house itself; but, for now, they simply bring us joy through the incredible talent of the artisans who created them. I’m an art historian in a museum, which is a mixed blessing, because it means I have loads of ideas, but also very expensive taste – and a rather modest salary. So it’s very much a work in progress! We started collecting in summer 2021 and have already been, several times, to both Miniatura and the Kensington Dolls House Festival. I can usually be found rushing around in excitement, while Nick takes time out with a coffee.

Follow our site to see our new acquisitions of miniatures, and (hopefully) our construction of the proper Quartermaine Hall one day in the future. We’ll share pieces by some of the brilliant miniaturists working today, as well as learning about, and paying tribute to, the many talented artisans of previous generations, who are sadly no longer producing work. (We are eager to know more about the miniaturists in the collection, so if you have any further information, please do get in touch!) The aim is to end up with a blend of both vintage and new miniatures, but the governing principle is quality above all.