Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Dollhouse furniture review: Ryan's Room

Since Ms. Z requested that her pandas have an "outside" to their home, we thought it would be good to furnish it. We put this super cute patio set from Ryan's Room on her Christmas list and my SIL picked it up at the local toy store. At $14.99, it's not a bad price. The Ryan's Room sets run a little cheaper than the Plan Toys sets and have about the same number of pieces in each one.

Scale: The pandas fit into the chairs really well. That's Papa and his daughter in the picture. She looks pretty mad in all of the shots. I don't remember what they were talking about. Although I didn't have any other chairs to compare these to, they are similar in scale to the Plan Toys, Educo/Hape, and Le Toy Van. While the furniture is larger than the Calico Critters (Sylvanian Families) characters, this does not seem out of place. These pieces are also larger than the Enchantmints brand, reviewed earlier.

Quality: The quality of these pieces is good. They are not as good as Plan Toys but comparable given their lower price point. They are constructed very well and I don't see these falling apart anytime soon but the attention to craftsmanship is not there. There are some splinters hanging off several of the cuts and the paint job on the grill is messy. The glue is fine -- no problems there. I do really like the detail on the flowers (the stems are wire so they bend).

Overall, I do like the Ryan's Room dollhouse furniture. They have the same style as the Plan Toys so they can be used together without issue. I like that they make use of the packaging. There are illustrations on the box that you can cut out to add "cushions" to the chairs and something to set on the table. That's an interesting touch. There is nice detail on the exterior paint on the Ryan's Room Carry N Play dollhouse that we have as well.

Thanks to Auntie Steph for letting me photograph this before Christmas. I think this will be a major hit.

If you would like to read the rest of the dollhouse furniture reviews, click here.