The Last Post and the Ones That Got Away

This isn't really the last post from Hand Built History, but it's the last one to consist solely of a bit of written fluff plus images from my desktop archive, because I am all out of them now. However, this brings us to Phase Two  I do have a good few more things I have built which I didn't photograph because there was no "platform", if that's the right word, to publicise them. I wasn't selling anything, my mates saw the actual models, and I had no need and no means to photograph them. I am now broadly set up to take pictures again though, with Phil Olley's advice, and will be experimenting with this during the coming week. Depending how that goes we may have posts of miniature Belgium, Belorussia or Bohemia in a few days time. Get the little "teaser" there, eh!

Today though, here's three images of a German village house I made with and for Phil, whose Imagi-Nations set up you will know about. My idea was that I was going to show him how quick and easy it really was, he would help in this and then fly off to make his own buildings. But we spent a couple of long evenings making this and then another long evening just starting to paint it, and I could see Phil's eyes glazing over a bit! Really it was a daft idea to start with a timber-framed building, because they are time-consuming to make and fiddly to paint. So I finished it off myself, presented it to Phil earlier this year and in no time he had photographed it as part of the "fairy-tale Germany" over which his Vaubarians and what-not campaign so winsomely.

Before you get to the pictures though, I wanted to mention, or lament really, the Ones That Got Away, the buildings I didn't get photographs of and no longer have the opportunity to do so, hence they will probably not be seen now. Which is a pity, because they were some of my nicest work. 

Mostly these were made with and for my much-missed friend Mark Sturmey, who passed away four years ago now after bravely fighting Motor Neurone Disease. Mark had eclectic interests in terms of wargames periods and the models concerned were for the Trojan Wars and the Carlist Wars in the Basque region of 1830's Spain. Some of this was models I made as presents for Mark, some he paid me for and a some we made between us, as Mark was learning to build terrain very skilfully before the cruel condition took away the strength of his hands. Mark's family retained all these models. Anyway, the Trojan things comprised houses and a temple meant to eventually go behind the walls of Troy; it was interesting to research a very different period, There was a lot more Spanish stuff though: a town, a unique Basque farm, a storehouse, wells, wayside crosses and a beautiful baroque church.

Finally, I made some lovely German village units for a friendly customer called Jonathon Marcus, who used to work for the BBC. I think I probably photographed them at the time, but those images never got stored on my PC, so are lost. 

That's my little lament over. Here's Phil's house and I hope to have more stuff for you before many days at all. Cheers.