Enfilade

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The Uppark dolls’ house from 1732, currently installed at the Huguenot Museum in Rochester. The Neo-Palladian house was a gift to ten-year-old Sarah Lethieullier from her father, who acquired it fully equipped from the Covent Garden auctioneer Christopher Cock. More information is available from Tessa Murdoch’s December 2023 Apollo article.

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Registration for the symposium is available at Eventbrite:

The Art of the Dolls’ House: The 49th Annual Furniture History Society Symposium
Online and in-person, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 22 March 2025

Led by Tessa Murdoch

An international roster of speakers will celebrate the earliest surviving European dolls’ houses preserved in The Netherlands and Nuremberg. That tradition developed in Britain where two beautifully furnished ‘baby’ houses treasured by Huguenot heiresses are today curated by the National Trust. The dolls’ house belonging to Petronella de la Court in Utrecht complemented her contemporary art collection. 300 years later, model maker Ben Taggart will speak about making models of historic houses. Architect-designed Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House has just celebrated its centenary whilst the installation of dolls’ houses at the Young V&A by Rachel Whiteread and the curatorial team have contributed to its celebratory position as the 2024 Art Fund Museum of the Year. The symposium will revisit these miniature homes and explore their legacy and creative inspiration as educational tools opening the eyes of successive generations through fascination with miniature worlds.

There will be an opportunity for delegates to visit the exhibition of Sarah Lethieullier’s 1730s dolls’ house at the Huguenot Museum, Rochester, Kent on Friday, 21 March 2025.

p r o g r a m m e

10.00  Registration

10.30  Welcome by Christopher Rowell (FHS Chairman)

10.35  Session 1 | The European Dolls’ House
Moderated by Christopher Rowell
• Revisiting the ‘Nuremberg Houses’: 17th-Century Miniature Households as Imperfect Windows into the Past — Heike Zech, (Deputy Director, Germanisches Museum, Nuremberg)
• At Home in the 17th Century: The Rijksmuseum Dolls’ Houses — Sara van Dijk (Curator of Textiles, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
• Petronella de La Court’s Dolls’ House in Utrecht (1670–1690): Registration, Research, and Re-Installation — Natalie Dubois (Curator of Applied Art and Design, Centraal Museum, Utrecht)
• Kinnaird Castle: A Miniature Mystery — Ben Taggart (model maker of historic properties)

12.45  Lunch — Study Sessions: Demonstration of miniature furniture making by Terence Facey and looking at silver toys with Kirstin Kennedy (curator, V&A Metalwork)

2.00  Session 2 | National Trust Dolls’ Houses
Moderated by Megan Wheeler (Assistant Curator, Furniture, National Trust)
• ‘Deceptively Spacious’: The Dolls’ House and Framing Significance and Story at Nostell — Simon McCormack (Property Curator, Nostell Priory, National Trust)
• The Lethieullier Family Dolls’ House at the Huguenot Museum — Tessa Murdoch

2.55  Break for tea

3.20  Session 3 | Displaying Dolls’ Houses
Moderated by Tessa Murdoch
• Fitted up with Perfect Fidelity’: Lutyens and Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House — Kathryn Jones (Senior Curator of Decorative Arts, Royal Collection Trust)
• Dolls’ Houses from the V&A — William Newton (Curator, Young V&A)

4.25  Closing remarks