Tag Archives: 2mm

This week we have further additions to the Roman buildings collection in the Small Scale Scenery range.

First up we have a Roman baths complex, based on a reconstruction of the ones in Weißenburg in Germany, discovered in 1977. It has the distinctive vaulted roofs over the various hot, warm and cold baths, and a circular laconicum (sweat room – equivalent to a sauna).

Next is the Mausoleum of Galerius, also known as the Rotunda of Galerius. This was built by the Emperor Galerius in AD306 in Thessaloniki, Greece. The 30m dome is comparable to, although much smaller than, Rome’s Pantheon and was possibly intended as his mausoleum. It has been through multiple uses over the years, as a Christian Basilica and church and Muslim mosque, from which use a minaret still survives. Nowadays it’s a designated historical monument, although the Orthodox church still uses it for certain events. Our model shows it as built, without the modifications of later years.

Previewed before Joy of Six, the next new item is the Porta Nigra, or ‘Black Gate’ from Trier in Germany (the name refers simply to the type of stone used, rather than anything more sinister). It was built in AD170 as the largest of the four gates in the city walls. In the Middle Ages it too was repurposed as a church, with significant additional building works including a spire – it also lost the top of one of the original towers in the process. This was reversed in 1804 when Napoleon ordered that it should be restored to its Roman form. Again, this model shows the gate in its original form.

Finally, we’ve created some new wall sections for the Modular Castle set. These have curved bastions with shallow roofs which match those of the Porta Nigra, so you can recreate a walled Roman city. You can see them in the image above with the gateway.

SSS-8203 – Porta Nigra – £2.50
SSS-8204 – Mausoleum of Galerius – £2.00
SSS-8205 – Roman Baths – £2.50
SSS-8120e – Walled with Roof Bastion (x2) – £1.50

LINK

First, a service update – there was an issue with the power at the farm which hosts the Brigade workshop earlier this week; long story, but in summary we lost a) a morning’s work, and b) several items of kit and most of the ceiling lights, blown by a power surge. As well as that essential piece of equipment, the workshop DAB radio, we also lost the air compressor which powers the pressure pot we use for resin casting (which itself was only three months old, a replacement for the previous one that just wore out). So the upshot is that we’re a bit behind on orders, especially ones which have a lot of resin items in them. This is then going to be compounded by Tony having some time off next week, although there will be some weekend working tomorrow to try and keep the backlog to a minimum. If you have an order outstanding with us, it could be a few days before we get to it, and any orders that arrive in the next 7 days probably won’t get looked at until Tony’s back on the 17th.

Now onto this week’s new release…

In the 50s and 60s the Soviet Union faced a severe housing shortage, partly as a consequence of the damage caused by the Second World War. One solution was the Khrushchevka (or Khrushchyovka), a prefabricated apartment block made of concrete panels that could be constructed in as little as two weeks. Much of the work was done off-site – even entire bathrooms would be assembled in a factory, shipped to the site and just plumbed in. Quality was low, but as many as 64000 units were built just in Moscow in a few years.

Almost all were five storey buildings – this was the maximum height of apartment building that was permitted to be built without incorporating lifts. The dimensions varied, the modular panel design allowed extra units to be bolted on as necessary. Most had flat roofs, although some had shallow pitched roofs or have been retrofitted with them in later years.

Khrushchevkas were built all over the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries, and many survive to this day, way beyond their designed lifespan. Some have been refurbished, others soldier on with a patchwork of repairs. Similar prefab units have appeared in other countries over the years, such as Japanese Danchi.

Our Khrushchevka set includes four slightly different resin apartment blocks – all suitably drab and grey for the era.

SSS-8202 – Khrushchevka Apartments (x4) – £3.00

LINK

This week’s new release is a collaborative effort between the two Brigadiers. Both of us independently created a couple of new 1/1000th fortress/castle models along a similar theme without the other knowing, and we’ve decided to release them at the same time since they’re linked.

A little bit of history first – in the mid C.16th, Henry VIII built a series of fortifications along the coast of England and Wales known as either Henrician Castles or Device Forts (a Device was the financial instrument used to pay for them) to defend against the threat of French or Spanish attack. These range from large stone castles to blockhouses and earthworks – Wikipedia has a list of over forty of them. We already have a couple in the range – both St Mawes and Southsea Castle were Device forts.

First to Phil’s contributions – he’s made two versions of Deal Castle, one of the largest and best preserved of the Device Forts. It has six semi-circular bastions surrounding a circular keep, almost like a six-leafed clover, with as many as 66 firing positions. In the 19th century a house was built on the seaward side to accommodate the Captain of the castle (which caused some controversy over tax arrangements – should the castle now be taxed as a private residence ?) and one commander even went so far as to build a private entrance with foot bridge so he could avoid the toll gate outside the castle’s main entrance ! The house stood out like a sore thumb architecturally, and in November 1940 the Luftwaffe managed to do everyone a favour by almost completely destroying it. In the 50s the castle was restored to its current state, removing much of the later additions and largely returning it to the original design. Phil has made versions both with and without the Captain’s House so you can make up your own mind.

Tony’s efforts aren’t as grand, representing two of the smaller fortifications. Portland Castle and Sandsfoot Castle were both built to defend the Portland Roads anchorage on the south coast of Dorset, not far from Weymouth.

Portland Castle, on the Isle of Portland, is built in a fan shape with a central tower and curved gun battery with guns on two levels. It was completed in 1541 but like many of its contemporaries it never saw action against the French or Spanish – although it was besieged in the English Civil War.

Sandsfoot Castle covered the northern part of the Roads. Built to a completely different design, it consisted of a blockhouse with a gun platform on the seaward side. It’s military career was similar to Portland’s, only seeing service in the Civil War. It has suffered badly from coastal erosion – the gun platform has completely vanished and only ruins remain.

SSS-8195 – Deal Castle – £3.50
SSS-8195a – Deal Castle – Captain’s House – £3.50
SSS-8196 – Portland Castle – £1.50
SSS-8197 – Sandsfoot Castle – £1.00

LINK

After a period of radio silence here, we’re back. We re-opened the website a couple of weeks ago, although we did it quietly to avoid being swamped by orders (which sort of worked).

We’ve also been working on some new releases, as we’ve been a bit sluggish on that front for a while. We have a number lined up across several ranges for the coming weeks, starting today with a pair of 2mm ancient structures.

The first is another addition to our range of Roman architecture – it’s a enclosed forum (marketplace) with a small basilica at one end and galleried walls around the outside. Most decent sized towns would have at least one.

The second release is much, much older at well over 4000 years. The Ziggurat of Ur is a large, iconic temple built by the Sumerian King Ur-Nammu in the 21st century BC near Nasariyah in present-day Iraq. The structure is over 60m wide and 30m high, built in the form of a stepped pyramid. Over the years the temple deteriorated and 1500 years later it was restored by King Nabonidus, the last king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. Once again time took its toll, and the Ziggurat was little more than a solid mass of mud bricks. In the latter part of the 20th century the lower facade and main staircase were restored by Saddam Hussein, although the upper levels remain a pile of rubble.

Our version is obviously slightly conjectural, since no-one knows exactly what the upper levels looked like originally (even King Nabonidus’ rebuild was apparently rather different from the original form). But we’ve gone with a reconstruction that hopefully isn’t too far from what King Ur-Nammu saw all those centuries ago.

SSS-8193 – Roman Forum – £3.50
SSS-8194 – Ziggurat of Ur – £3.50

LINK