diff --git a/src/scaffoldmaker/scaffolds.py b/src/scaffoldmaker/scaffolds.py
index ccee1115..584bbea9 100644
--- a/src/scaffoldmaker/scaffolds.py
+++ b/src/scaffoldmaker/scaffolds.py
@@ -109,18 +109,18 @@ def findScaffoldTypeByName(self, name):
         return None
 
     def getDefaultMeshType(self):
-        '''
+        """
         Deprecated: use getDefaultScaffoldType()
-        '''
+        """
         return self.getDefaultScaffoldType()
 
     def getDefaultScaffoldType(self):
         return MeshType_3d_box1
 
     def getMeshTypes(self):
-        '''
+        """
         Deprecated: use getScaffoldTypes()
-        '''
+        """
         return self.getScaffoldTypes()
 
     def getScaffoldTypes(self):
@@ -128,9 +128,9 @@ def getScaffoldTypes(self):
 
 
 class Scaffolds_JSONEncoder(json.JSONEncoder):
-    '''
+    """
     Class encoding scaffold objects in JSON. Pass as cls argument to json.dumps.
-    '''
+    """
 
     def default(self, obj):
         if isinstance(obj, ScaffoldPackage):
@@ -144,11 +144,14 @@ def default(self, obj):
 
 
 def Scaffolds_decodeJSON(dct):
-    '''
+    """
     Function for passing as object_hook argument to json.loads.
     Constructs scaffold objects from their JSON object encoding.
-    '''
-    if ('_ScaffoldPackage' in dct):
+    """
+    for key in dct.keys():
+        if isinstance(dct[key], dict):
+            dct[key] = Scaffolds_decodeJSON(dct[key])
+    if '_ScaffoldPackage' in dct:
         scaffoldType = Scaffolds().findScaffoldTypeByName(dct['scaffoldTypeName'])
         #print('Scaffolds_decodeJSON scaffoldType',scaffoldType.getName(), dct)
         return ScaffoldPackage(scaffoldType, dct)