3-year-old right at home in mini-mansion playhouse
Custom builder creates small-scale dream house in family’s backyard
Lila Romo is only 3, but she already has her dream house. Well, a dream playhouse that, incredibly, is built almost like a real house.
It took about a month to construct the one-room, $8,000 backyard mini-mansion. It measures 10 by 10 feet, has a floor of tile imported from Mexico, a chandelier and plenty of plexiglass windows for safety.
But for the pandemic, Lila Romo would be the most popular kid in her Castle Hills neighborhood.
Lila’s parents, Victor and Malisa, got the idea to build their daughter her very own child-size dream house while visiting relatives in Manchester, England. While there, they took Lila to the Great Northern free play area downtown, a large amphitheater set aside for children that includes its own playhouse, complete with pretend kitchen and cafe, and a story-time library.
Lila was enthralled. “She loved, loved, loved it,” said Victor, an emergency room physician with Methodist Healthcare. “When it was time to go, she and the other kids playing there had to be dragged away. It was like there were lines in the sand from their fingernails.”
Once back home, Victor scrapped his plans to build a
storage shed in the backyard of his childhood home where he and Malisa now live. Instead, he sent pictures of the British playhouse to his friend Dave Peters, owner of the San Antonio custom home and remodeling com
pany D. Michael Design.
“In about 15 minutes, Dave sent me back all these plans for what’s now Lila’s Playhouse,” he said.
What Lila loves about the house, her parents say, is the play kitchen where she bakes
cakes, the kid-size table and the plastic flowers in the front window planters. On a recent visit, she happily showed off the play telephone she uses to call her aunt, the pegboard on one wall to hold her toys and the
small chandelier hanging from the ceiling (bought from Amazon). There’s even a handmade sign hanging above the door reading “Lila’s Playhouse.”
But perhaps her favorite
part of the house are the shutters, which are painted with erasable chalkboard paint so she can draw on them.
The house is surprisingly well built. Peters framed the structure using 2-by-4 exterior walls and 2-by-6 ceiling joists set 16 inches on center. He also used solid wood for the siding and encapsulation paint for better weather protection.
“Other than the fact that
it’s not insulated or wired, I built like I build any other full-size house,” he said.
The playhouse sits on a concrete slab that previously served as a parking spot for an RV and as a basketball court, now covered with artificial turf.
Her mother’s favorite thing about the house? It’s right in the backyard where she can see it.
“Lila’s very independent and can play by herself for a long time,” she said. “And I can watch her from anywhere in the house. It’s better than having a pool.”
Although playhouse visitors so far so far have been limited to Lila’s cousins, it’s obvious the structure has been a point of curiosity to the neighbors.
“We could see people looking in from the street while it was being built,” Victor said.
It has also garnered interest online. When Peters posted a photo on his company Instagram page, he quickly booked another job and has gotten several inquiries about others.