15mm Hovels Village

This post is really thanks to Mike, and results from a question he put in a comment, asking if I was scratch building all of my terrain. So hello Mike, and the short answer is no. Just most of it. But thanks for prompting me to finaly do somthing with these models.

The Hovels buildings in this post were bought way back when Salute was still in Kennsington town all, and I was a young fresh faced designer working in London. They were bought with the idea of using them as the center of a relatively generic village which would fit a wide range of time frames and locations in 15mm scale. The central main one being 15mm Spanish war of succession. That original idea still stands, the only real change over the years has been the huge increase in range and quality of 10mm figure ranges available. This has lead to some of my periods of interest moving from 15mm over to 10mm, due to the size constraints I work within and also cost. More bang for your buck, as our American cousin's would say.

From my point of view although 15mm scale these buildings are fine for using with 10mm stuff as well. The building come from the Hovels European range and the Rural range, the 5 half timbers houses are still less than £4 each, which to me seems very reasonable. They are all going to be based onto 3x3 inch art board bases, with the Big house going onto a 3x6 inch base for its formal gardens to fit onto. With the houses I also bought a selection of stone walls, fences and stocks, I have an idea they were from Hallmark figures, but I could be wrong. So these will be used on the bases as well.

The big house was put onto a foam board base within the walled garden, all the hedging is from pan scouring pads, cut to shape with a scalpel, the gate posts are plastic sprue from an Airfix 1/24th scale Hurricane. A nice hexagonal shape and the balls on top are from the daughter's bede tin. The formal fountain is a spindle from a boots floss dispenser. When hot gluing this to the base the glue started to pull up when I was moving the glue gun away. I had one of those eureka moments and thought, that kind of looks a bit like a fountain, so there it stands. Water feature number one. I'm sure other people must have done the same, but hay I was quite chuffed with the result.

Roman Watch Tower

My final 10mm scale Roman post for a time, pictures of the finished watch tower, painted and flocked, based on the ubiquitous free CD base. Palisade made from coffee sticks, tower and roof from ribbed card.

Thinking ahead to the new year, going to have a bit of a re-jig on the old blog, keeping the terrain emphasis, but with a special terrain project I've been thinking about for a while and also posting more of my troops, in a rather pathetic effort at self motivation. I've been so busy building terrain over the past year, that you would be hard pressed to have a small domestic argument with the finished forces I have at my disposal.

Currently ensconced in the snug world of the 18th coffee house, planning out the grounds of my country house. Till next time.

Roman Temple

Two pictures showing the finished temple. Not bad for a deodorant lid and a 25p mini cd. The is a circular plinth inside the temple for a statue to go on. The ivy growing up the right hand side of the building is made up from PVA glue and tea leaves in multiple layers. The flagstones in front of the door is a piece of foam board with the tiles cut in freehand with a scalpel.

The Finished Fort

The finished fort, using the wall sections with the addition of corner towers. to create the fort. I'm pleased with how this has turned out. Just need to post some pictures of the finished watch tower and the temple and then I will be moving on from Rome for a time. Perhaps into 17/18th century Europe. However in the back of my mind the are still lurking native villages, civilian settlement for outside the fort walls, and to go with the breached section of wall, an alternative centre for the fort with burnt out buildings. So in time I'm sure I'll be back to Romes northan frontier.

The Wall

The wall shown in all its 60cm glory, minus the breached section, with marching camp and WIP watch tower in the background. The watch tower and temple are both finished now, just need to photograph them.

10mm Roman Buildings

Pictures of the finished Roman buildings designed to go into the centre of the fort. I always try and add in some final details to what ever I'm building to give it that extra bit of life, if that's the right word. A couple of 15mm metal barrels don't look out of scale, and a couple of vines growing up the garden wall of the tribunes villa.

While looking at a website on Roman Scotland Link I come across a great banner for the Ninth Legion. Great inspiration for some Roman Army sign writing on the Barack blocks.