Author Topic: Building Contest 2013: 9 - A Gem of a Victorian: Dent-de-Lion Villa  (Read 4567 times)

Offline hazelnut

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Lot size 20x30 (screenshots taken at 178 Savannah Lane, Twinbrook)
2 bed spaces (1 double), 1 bath.  There is a second bedroom, currently being used as a hobbies room.
Price on original lot: §35000 furnished, §24169 unfurnished

Content used:
Expansions: World Adventures, Ambitions, Generations, Showtime and Supernatural
Stuff packs: Outdoor Living, Master Suite
Free store content: Earth Day

Dent-de-Lion Villa is a small Victorian town house named after a certain yellow flower.  (If you can’t eradicate them from the lot, you might as well make the best of it…)    It is is built of red bricks with feature stonework and a typical string course of Staffordshire Blue bricks forming the DPC.

Although the garden is still in need of some TLC, the house itself has been sensitively restored.  The impressive hallway with original encaustic floor tiles leads into a slightly gloomy but richly-coloured front parlour, with indoor plants, a grandmother clock, plenty of comfortable seating and the original fireplace.  Skilful Sims will be pleased to note that a computer and guitar are also included.  A door leads into the bright and airy kitchen-diner.

Upstairs are a small bedroom, currently being used as a hobbies room (complete with treadmill and easel), and a compact but fully-functional bathroom.  The master bedroom has a comfortable bed, cheval mirror and a cosy room-within-a-room in the tower.  The window-seat is perfect for snuggling up with a good book or a significant other.

Outdoors, the wrap-around verandah features a chess table, while the small but productive kitchen garden and the pond offer further skilling opportunities.





Dent-de-Lion Villa is loosely based on a number of Victorian houses in the town where I live.  It was only when it was almost finished that I realised how closely it resembles a scaled-down version of my grandparents’ house, which also had a tower and verandah (and a grandmother clock in the front room) but was a lot bigger.  Just as well, given that they raised six children there.  I have fond memories of the tower window-seat, although theirs was considerably larger – the ground floor of the tower was a breakfast room.  Sadly, Sims 3 has no way of reproducing that house’s sweeping stairs or the huge Edwardian rocking horse (with real saddle and bridle) on the landing, which was large enough to be ridden by a teenager.  Not that I ever did that, obviously…

Note:  when I export and re-import this house, it keeps showing up without a title or other information - and the mailbox and bin revert to the default positions for that lot.  I have no idea why.  The screenshots show their intended locations (moveobjects is needed for the mailbox).