I was thrilled to find this vintage Martin Fuch's toy kitchen last summer at a local flea market for $14. Click image to view larger. These cute tin kitchens were made in West Germany from the 1940's thru the early 1970's and came in all sorts of styles and colors and included a variety of cooking accessories. They've become quite collectible. Mine had seen better days for sure, so an up-cycle was in order.
The scale of the pots and pans are a bit large for the kitchen which is about 1:6 scale, or Barbie size; presuming I suppose, that little girls (not their dolls) would actually be doing the cooking. Because you could actually heat water on the little stove with a candle and "cook". Which is why, I presume, the red plastic pot handles were melted. Oops.
This kitchenware looked better after a good soak, a coat of varnish and a dab of copper paint.
Here's how the kitchen looked in its original state; I'd already removed the water dispenser.
The idea was to build a room-box for our miniature product photos. The kitchen is about 16" in length which was an easy fit in a standard sized box. I added wood trim, a bread board, an upper shelf and water taps.
I also made the wall clock and towel-shelf rack to hide the holes where the water dispenser was attached. Magnets hold them in place on the metal (faux tile) back splash. The oven mitt hides a burn on the face of the door. Another unfortunate...oops.
It works well for Barbie, a big-headed Blythe, or in this case, my pink princess ICY Miss. Looks like she is ready to start some Christmas baking. I love it!
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