Playhouses That Put Real Homes to Shame
These no-holds-barred mini-mansions have all the comforts of home & cost tens of thousands of dollars. Check out nine of the most amazing models around.
This 6-by-11-foot model from Lilliput Play Homes sells for $9,600. Its cool-kid features are a working brass-plated doorbell and knocker, sponge-painted interior walls, simulated wood floors, a skylight, a sunny upstairs balcony and a shady, columned porch. You can add a baby grand piano, tables, curtains, a tea set and an antique-designed kitchen stove by purchasing an accessory package.
Owners include NBA star Kobe Bryant and Hollywood socialite Candy Spelling, who purchased a playhouse for her daughter Tori's kids.
Adorned with warning signs made of weathered wood, this 6-by-11-foot playhouse has a front porch with a sliding peephole on the front door. The green-and-white clubhouse also has a loft with a skylight and telescope. Accessories include a table and chair set.
Richmond, Va.-based PoshTots builds its custom houses by hand, on location. And its client list reads like a who's who of the rich and famous. Customers have included actors Jada Pinkett Smith and Chris O'Donnell, supermodel Heidi Klum and NBA player Jason Kidd.
Priced at about $25,900, this pirate-ship "tree house" with two doorways comes with its own fabricated tree base. Perfect for baby-faced buccaneers, the structure features a front porch, an oversized balcony, lopsided windows, a cannon and a skeleton figurehead. Up top, there's a ship mast with a crow's nest and a skull-and-crossbones Jolly Roger blowing in the breeze.
The playhouse also has a firefighter's pole, monkey bars, a spiral slide and a belt swing. It measures 23 feet by 26 feet by 11 feet.
This pink confection with whimsical windmill blades may be a brighter alternative to the previous slide's pirate enclave. Sophie's Magical Windmill Playhouse, which is also available through PoshTots, features window planters, flower motifs, operable windows, and upper and lower decks with hand rails. Inside is a reading loft with decorative hand rails, a reading bench beneath a bay window, upholstered cushions and pillows, storage hideaways, concealed vents and decorative LED lighting. Inside, the floors are maple-wood vinyl, and the walls have wallpapered, graphic panels.
Priced at about $38,000, this playhouse measures 12 feet by 11 feet by 15 feet.
One of the most expensive houses from PoshTots people is this fort, priced at about $122,730. The Tumble Outpost comes with a lookout tower, two rock-climbing walls, a fire pole with a small play area below, a jail, a clubhouse with a deck and an 8-foot-long bridge with rope-net railings that connect to the main two-story fort.
There's a wrap-around ramp up to the second story to access a 12-foot-long slide in the front and a rope-net ladder in the back. A 9-foot-high bridge with 3-foot-high rails is set above two belt swings.
The Tumble Outpost is 35.5 feet by 28 feet by 15 feet.
Denver-based La Petite Maison says it has customized its bespoke, intricately detailed playhouses for royal families and red-carpet walkers.
Designed by Michelle Pollak and built by Alan Mowrer, La Petite's handcrafted houses range in price from $9,000 to more than $75,000. They can include granite kitchen countertops, a cable-ready media room, a fancy chandelier, crown moldings and window seats.
This Tudor playhouse is decked out in brick that was left over from the main house. It measures 14 feet by 16 feet by 12 feet.
As you might expect in any Victorian home, this La Petite Maison playhouse has a corner porch, a shingled turret and gingerbread gables. Its bright sunroom is home to white wicker furniture and comfy throw pillows.
This Victorian playhouse is 11 feet by 12 feet by 11 feet.
A cottage with white picket fences, this small home sits among lush landscaping and features a garlanded trellis leading to the front porch. It measures 12 feet by 14 feet by 11 feet.
La Petite Maison says it customizes each aspect of its playhouse creations. Interiors, for example, can include a formal dining room.
Based in The Woodlands, Texas, Sweet Retreat Kids sells playhouses as kits and custom homes. Their prices range from $800 to $50,000.
The Little Red Schoolhouse, which is made from environmentally friendly materials, includes a 10-foot-high bell cupola, six to eight working windows and doors for kids and adults. Available in three different sizes — 8 feet by 8, 10 or 12 feet — this one-room-schoolhouse kit costs $1,269.
Sweet Retreat also sells custom, luxury playhouses that take seven to 10 days to build. These playhouses can feature sleeping lofts, media rooms, dining rooms, decorative fireplaces and eat-in kitchens with custom cabinetry, sinks and working appliances — except the stove.
By Lauren Price of SwitchYard Media
Spare-no-expense mansions, elaborate pirate ships and tricked-out forts are just some of the playhouses that well-heeled adults are scooping up. Not only do these parents love pampering their kids, but they also have no problem forking over tens of thousands of dollars to do so.
Many of these more-art-than-play homes come with hardwood floors, operable windows with screens, mailboxes, doorbells that ring, remote-controlled garage doors and 8-foot-high ceilings to accommodate the occasional adult drop-in. Like other well-appointed homes, many also offer running water, electricity, air-conditioning and heating, upholstered sofas and chairs, dining-room sets, kitchens with working refrigerators, sunrooms, intercoms to the main house and even miniature baby grand pianos that really play.
Although some playhouses are built from kits, others are custom-built and can take several days or more to construct.