Cardboard House and Garden

Bored during lock-down and you want to be creative but don't have a lot of equipment ? Here is a low-cost project to keep children and adults busy !

If you have kids you can even use this project to create and tell them a story while you're tinkering.

• Cardboard
• Cutting tools
• Glue
• Colored card-stock paper
• Dyeing or paint (optional)

Before making the house we need a base to put it on !

The base measures 40x30x5 cm.

I cut the shape of the base then fold the side parts using a ruler so the fold goes precisely along the line.

I reinforce the angles with angle brackets and glue it all.

We now have a base !

We now have a nice flat surface to work on. Maybe ... too flat. It needs a bit of volume.

I will add volume by creating a pond in the garden.

I draw a potato-shaped pond and cut it off of the base.

I put a piece of cardboard under and draw a second, smaller, potato and cut it off. This will add depth to the pond.

Finally, I glue blue card-stock paper at the bottom of the pond.

I cut every part according to the given pattern.

You'd better add a door and windows or it will be dark in here !

You can also add shutters, a chimney, a door... you can add as much detail as you want !

For the roof, you can use single face corrugated cardboard, it will look nice and be done quickly.

Or you can choose to make every single tile. Making each tile a different shape and dying it a slightly different color will look way better and give the roof a more cartoon look.

Unfortunately the house doesn't have running water. We thus need to put a well in he garden.

I cut the shape of the well, then I do notches so the cardboard will easily wrap. The two pillars need to be aligned and parallels.

The roof structure is a pile of cardboard circles. The bigger one is 7 cm in diameter and the smaller is 3 cm.

To make the tiles i cut a card-stock circle and slice it like a pizza. I glue the slices on the roof with an offset so it doesn't looks too regular.

Don't forget the water ! A bit of blue card-stock paper will do the job.

Bob lives here, he is very nice.

Bob is made of card-stock paper rolls. To make the rolls, roll a piece of paper around a pencil, glue it and wait for it to dry.

You can now cut, fold, glue and dye the rolls to create Bob. (Dye/pain parts before assembling them)

Tiny rolls for the arms and legs, bigger rolls for the head, torso and shorts.

You can make him a hat so he doesn't have sunstroke.

His hands are made of wooden pearls, the hole in it will allow Bob to hold objects.

You can spend an infinite amount of time on this project since you can add an infinite amount of details !

The only limit is your imagination, get creative !

I, for example, added a stool for Bob, made him a fishing rod, a campfire to heat him, some bushes, a tree with a swing, a bucket for the well..