I found, in one of the kids or parenting magazines, plans for a Barbie house made out of plastic shelving. I made one for my dd and we've had a ball decorating it. I took cardboard and glued it to the back and sponge painted and even bought a discount border at Home Depot for a $1.00 (had to look through to find one that wasn't awful.) and used it as wall paper. We had some carpet remnants around and I cut them down and put rugs in. We've had lots of fun with color and deocorating. I even put a few holes in the cardboard for windows and glued little drapes to the sides of the windows. It's been fun for us.
If you go with this idea, make sure you use a long shelf and not a short one. You won't have enough room for all the Barbie stuff. (Found this out the hard way after Christmas. Luckily I hadn't started decorating the Barbie house yet!)
I use the top shelf of a long four shelf for storing the little things away from the baby, though she's starting to get interested in Barbies now too.
Good luck!
