Shifting Sands: Not the Novelty Rock Emporium

Part of shiftingsands.fotopic.revisited

Originally posted to www.shiftingsands.fotopic.net in February 2006, updated through to 14th May 2006.

One of the key structures for 'Shifting Sands' will be a typical seaside rock/ice cream sales kiosk, as illustrated in a previous gallery. Not only will this be key to provinding part of the seaside atmosphere, but it will also be a key element in hiding trains entering and leaving the hidden sidings.

I had planned for this to be a cafe rather than a kiosk, but I eventually hit upon the idea of using the roof from a Triang-Hornby 'modern' station building as a basis for the model, perhaps not the obvious contender to make a 7mm scale building. 

New walls were constructed from 3.5mm foamcore board, making a strong but lightweight structure. Window openings were made as appropriate.

A view from the corner of the building. The exposed edge of the foamcore is covered with 'Scotch' tape before adding the cladding.

The windows are modified from HO scale doors made by 'Smalltown USA'. These are similar to the windows I used on an office block on my 4mm scale layout 'Padgate Lane'. I modified these to set the opening paines further back, one window is modelled open and another closed. They are seen here with an unmodified example at the top. The open window will be the kiosk serving hatch, with perhaps a queue of hungry 7mm scale customers?!

The next stage of the project was to add vertical sections of 2.5 x 1 mm Evergreen styrene strip. These are attached with Solvent Free 'UHU' adhesive. A door frame has been added from 0.5 mm plasticard. The door will be represented by the surface of the foamcore board.

Horizontal planking is Slaters embossed plasticard, carefully cut to fit between the uprights. This is held in place with double-sided adhesive tape. A strip of 2.5 x 0.5 mm plasticard is added around the base of the model to represent framework.

11/03/06: I have added various pipework and roof detail to the building, pipe brackets are by S&D Models. And other parts from my spares boxes and some imagination! On the roof the extractor on the roof is a Walthers HO scale product and the tank is built from Wills box section sheet.

I have also built a basic interior, which will not be too visible through the windows but at least it is there....

14/05/06: It's been finished over a month now but I've only recently found the time to upload some photos of the completed, painted and weathered building.

"Two coffees and a large Coke" - Service with a smile? At the the other window, a tempting selection of ice lollies is on offer.

O9 Modeller would like to thank Mick Thornton for his help in creating this page.