Dear Readers,
I have been wanting to build a roombox for quite some time so I can take pictures of my dollies. I even chose the wood planks at the craft store but I am no good at this. Fast-foward 4 months and still no roombox so I decided out of desperation to try the Barbie Fashion Fever Build A Room Kit. It was a whopping $25 dollars on Amazon. I told you I was desperate >.<
The outside box looked so promising. It included two different wallpapers and ridges on the floor (which means I could re-use it for other wallpapers of my own), There was also a thin shelf and a few accessories like yellow stickers for the floor and other non-memorable plastic items.
The walls are made of two cardboard pieces that you can insert in the ridges you see on the floor. One side is covered with a rather hypnotic and annoying pattern of pink and red roses. The shelf is super thin and could probably carry only a frame or other light objects.
On the other side of the wall is another equally hypnotic pattern composed of white, green and blue diamond. Notice the gap in between the two walls? That's a design flaw. The miWorld mall store solved that issue by providing a small triangular plastic piece that connected the top of the two walls. I used tape on the back to do the same trick in this case.
The Barbie doll shown on the front of the box looks small but I think it's because she is standing in the middle of the room and the angle of the shot made her look that way. In reality, a Barbie doll is very tall for the walls of this room. See below for a comparison photo. From left to right: Barbie, Liv, J-Doll, and Licca.
I think the J-Doll and Licca dolls would be suitable for the height of this room because Barbie and Liv would look awkward in the shots unless they sit down.
In the picture below is J-Doll Marche. She is a beautiful doll with an awesome outfit. I changed her into a more comfortable attire. She is dressed in a white and green summer dress made by Re-ment. She was blessed with gorgeous soft hair so I did not have to rewig her like I did for J-Doll Esplanadi Katu.
The chair, footrest and table are from my Hannah Montana Malibu Beach House. The flower and vase are accessories from a Barbie blue kitchen set.
J-Doll Esplanadi Katu was invited for an afternoon tea. Her grey shorts and white top with blue polka dot are also made by Re-ment. Shelf, chairs and table by IKEA and all tea cups and plates by Re-ment. The scones and muffin are from Re-ment Bread and Butter Collection. They look amazingly real and the texture was even well done! It was just too much fun to set up this scene! But that red line on the wallpaper corner annoyed me to no end!
I had to take a shot from another angle to hide that red line. Don't you think it looks less distracting now that it is no longer there? That's another design flaw. The red line is from the other side of the wall covered with the roses. What an unprofessional finish to leave it there for the other wallpaper!
The floor is meh. The yellow stickers were ridiculous and I would have preferred another cardboard insert to show a proper wood floor or carpet or something actually less tacky than huge pink tiles but hey, this is Barbie stuff so getting pink is rather the norm.
I do love that Mattel actually came up with a roombox but it could have been so much better. Sadly, they didn't improve on the initial design and it fell out of production. I hope they will eventually release something close to that idea but with better walls and floors and maybe allow for a window or door to be added. That would be AWESOME!
I think I overpaid for this and it is really not worth the $25 I spent. I am still biting my hands over that but it may have possibilities and I will look into creating my own wallpapers... preferably without hypnotic patterns or a red line smack in the corner of the room!
