I have recently built a few kits for my Cityscape including Merchant Row I, II & III…but they dont look like buildings I am familiar with. I was pondering the question and last time I looked at The Magnolia Route site, I noticed that his buildings have awnings… (great site btw)
The light bulb switched on as this is how buildings look in Brisvegas… and how I remember them looking as a kid. Large sign-written awnings with vertical signs above them facing both ways up and down the street.
My question is this… Do US buildings in the late 1960s have these solid awnings that extend to the edge of the footpath?
If so, how would you achieve the styling of the awning?
Awnings used to be extremely popular long before the advent of air conditioning. They were used extensively in large and small cities and in towns, villages and hamlets all across the country. Even after air-conditioning became common, awnings were still used to reduce sunlight coming in through the windows.
There was a series of articles on making awnings in several different styles, and I’m not sure but I think it was Model Railroading from earlier this year. Very good set of articles.
Perhaps someone on the forum with a better memory than mine can help identify the magazine that printed the articles.
Darrell, helpful, but can’t remember s - - t, and quiet…for now
Looked up"awning" on the index of magazines,and got three hits, two of which are pretty promising, but not from this year. (Darrell, you don’t need a good memory at all with a well run index of articles!)
So, although they might not be the ones Darrell is thinking of, there were two articles by Roy M. Stanley, titled “Easy Awnings, part 1” and “Easy Awnings, the conclusion” in the November and December, 1989 issues of Model Railroading. (This has been changed from the original, which cited the wrong modeling magazine.)
And if they are the ones Darrell is thinking of, he has a lot better memory than he thinks.
On another note, I remember that in Staten Island where I grew up, awnings were a pretty ubiquitous building feature for commercial store fronts, at least through the mid-'60s, and no self-respecting commercial establishment would be without one in the '50s or before. They were generally canvas, though, not solid, so that they could be rolled up if considered necessary. For instance, at the close of business. And if you really want to super-detail, don’t forget the crank at one side of the awning, so that you can roll up the canvas.
Not very many places that I knew of had solid, sheet metal type awnings, though.
I recall a more recent article on structures that included a segment on awnings. I think the author was Earl Smallshaw and it was a set of buildings modified from kits. This might have been within the last five years.
If I recall right, Smallshaw used household aluminum foil (painted obviously) over a simple wire frame to make his awnings. Perhaps the heavy duty kind used to cook turkey would hold its shape best. I know some people use paper and I have seen paper cutout awnings for sale, but the aluminum foil awnings looked great.
And it could model both the flexible tarp type awnings that merchants used to lower using a crank, as well as the solid and permanent awnings made of steel – that yes are still seen in some smaller cities that still have real shopping districts. With rising energy costs I wonder if people will rediscover the cooling benefits of awnings.
Dave Nelson
It seems incongruent to me that all of our buildings were fitted out this way in Australia but your’s aren’t… maybe snow is an issue? We obviously have much harsher heat conditions but none of the “cold” issues like the weight of snow…
Anyone have a real picture to illustrate these awnings?
Thanks for the responses so far
BTW I have read the article of tinfoil awnings… it is in a kitbash article using some DPM kits I believe…
Perhaps some of the evergreen or plastruct sheet plastic with siding or even fence like textures would replicate the steel awning of the sort one sees in the lower right corner on this website http://www.lasvegaspatiocovers.com/awnings.html
In most of the United States, from the latter half of the 19th century through the mid 1960’s, retractable canvas awnings were the norm on commercial establishments. Relatively small, fixed, metal awnings were employed mainly on residences, first in the West Coast and by the middle decades of the 20th century in the East as well. Often the purpose of awnings on commercial store fronts was to shade window displays to keep them from fading, as much as for the cooling effect.
I’m glad you enjoyed the awnings I made for my courthouse square buildings. At least in the south these were EXTREMELY prevalent - particularly in small towns. I can’t tell you how many small Mississippi towns still have these in their “business districts”. It added so much to the stock DPM and Smalltown USA kits. I scratchbuilt mine from plain sheet styrene horizontally framed with styrene C-channel strips. Thin brass wire is used for the support hangers.
Most awnings I’m familiar with were designed to butt up against that of the neighboring building, even at different heights, so that a shopper is protected from the elements throughout the length of the sidewalk. This is how I designed the east side of the “square” where possible. One other neat detail I added was to hang signs under the awnings, like a vintage arrow-shaped “Coca Cola Sold Here” sign pointing to the diner entrance (to the right of the white delivery van). Names of the businesses were also common on suspended signage under awnings.
The neatest awning I have is the one on the corner diner. It covers two walls and has a curved corner - again very typical of the 1950’s in particular.
One article I can highly recommend is Modernizing for the 1950’s (Parts 1 and 2) which ran in the December 1998 and January 1999 Railroad Model Craftsman. It was written by prolific author Bob Smaus and covers metal awnings and lower tile facades which were also popular in the 50’s. A lot of my ideas and methods came from that article. There are some fabulous pictures also!
My signs are also scratchbuilt from styrene and covered with graphics I make myself on the computer. One really cool one is the classic Western Auto sign. While not exact, I found a closely matched font and copied the design from a picture. It easily passes for the real thing.
thanks guys, even though I am now more confused than ever [:P]
Cliff’s site gave me the inspiration, as that is how buildings here look… The stock DPM and Walthers kits look kind of nude to me without the awnings. Can I do this for late 60’s, West Viriginia? or will that cause the rivet counters to go into overdrive…not that it matters but I would like to try my best not to make silly and obvious mistakes [:D]
I know here in Mississippi these types of metal awnings existed in the sixties through present day. Maybe one reason these are so plentiful here is the fact that we have no snow to speak of. In fact, in my 40+ years it has snowed maybe a dozen times…and even then it rarely accumulates to more than three inches. Now ice storms are another matter, but I can’t see that they would pose a hazard to metal awnings. In areas of the country where the white stuff can be a foot or more deep, I can see where retractable awnings are necessary. West Virginia - well, thats a toss up. I did live in Virginia (not West) for three years and suffered through the blizzard of '96. We had drifts over three feet deep. I never knew hell could be that cold!!! [:D]
I assume such accumulations are possible in West Virginia as well. Maybe someone out there is a better authority on the West Virginia climate.
Grubby, I could be off a bit here but as I recall by the late 1960’s canvas awnings on commercial structures were disappearing in most places in the eastern U.S. Larger towns and cities in West Virginia definitely had employed canvas awnings (not the marquee-like rigid, flat, structures seen in the Southern states and on Cliff’s layout) in the 1950’s and earlier. Larger cities probably would have dropped awnings first, with smalltown stores possibly keeping them (if they ever had them to start with) quite a bit longer.
If you want to accurately model a small WVa coal mining town you really need to consult some period photos to attain any degree of reality. You might start with the famous RR town of Thurmond, WVa as an example for structures and detailing, it having been written up in many model railroading magazines over the years.
This can be pretty tricky, since it can depend on the size of the town or city that you want to model.
You can get some idea of small town West Virginia coal country from the movie “October Sky”, which is based on the book “Rocket Boys” by Homer H. Hickam, Jr. Both the movie and the book are really interesting for their own sakes as well. The time for the story is 1957 and immediately thereafter, so it wouldn’t be too far off from the 1960’s. My impression from reading the books (the first one was so successful that the author wrote a sequel and a few others on similar themes) is that folks in small West Virginia towns don’t change things much just for the sake of change…
More to the point, if you visit a few websites related to the town of Coalwood , you can get an idea of the type of buildings in small town West Virginia. Here are a couple of them:
In extreme cases, the downtown of small towns could consist of nothing much more than the company store, many of which tended to look alike, and different from what most people think of when they think “store.”
On the other hand, some of the bigger towns and cities in West Virginia can look pretty cosmopolitan. A good source for pictures of many locations in West Virginia is:
Remember, though, I’ve never been there as a tourist, so my impressions are formed just from pictures that I’ve come across, either by accident or prompted by this thread. It’s been fun by the way. Your mentioning West Virginia reminded me of the work of a friend who models Pennsylvania coal and lumbering prototypes. Pennsylvania, which I have been to, shares some commonalities with West Virginia.
Part of your confusion, Grubby, may be due to north America’s rather diverse weather. Retractable awnings are more useful in the snowy North and Midwest, but permanent wood or metal shade structures (awnings or other sorts) are more common in the South and West where the weather is hotter and snow is less present. Although sometimes one would find canvas awnings in the west because they were light and cheap.
Wooden awnings were also common in older cities, if your town dates from before 1800 and has yet to feel the touch of urban renewal it might feature an old building or two that still has a wooden awning in front.
West Virginia is technically “south” but it is in the very northern part of the South, and thus doesn’t have the snow-free winters that the Deep South has–canvas awnings might be more common.
Thanks guys… yes my confusion is basically that I have no “real” knowledge of the area I am modelling only what I see in photos etc. Guess that is the price you pay for choosing a prototype that is a 17 hour flight from home…
I have had a look through all the links, I guess I am looking for a larger urban area with an industrial fringe to the city… any help would be appreciated. Thanks for the help with the awnings, I guess they have to be retractable canvas style [:(]
