I will be in the process of moving and when I am finished I will be/should be able to start working on the layout. The buildings I have is more European (was given about 18 for free), but will be modeling the Santa Fe, Engines/cars with few Union Pacific cars mostly. The scenery will probably include some desert landscaping (may include mine shaft/abandoned mining/ghost town area and also thinking junkyard/modern on another area. Would you utilize the buildings given or maybe see if you could trade/get ones more appropriate for the area the two train lines run. I am going to improvise the track plan to fit the room that the train will be going in. Thanks for any suggestions.
Not sure how much realism you are going for, but sounds like you’re planning to model the Southwest US. In that case, outside of perhaps a outdoor style “mall district” or planned community, European buildings probably are not going to work as realistic - I assume you refer to the older-style German/Danish residences, apartments, stores, and factories made by the likes of Kibri, Faller, Heljan, etc, as their more modern style buildings are generic enough to readily suit North American layouts. No, those older German/Danish/Dutch buildings don’t look very American
If you were doing some older North East/Midwest city that had a large Central European population (like Milwaukee), then you could get away with it much easier.
ETA - sounds like these buildings are already built - back in the day of the 1980s, when we didn’t have as wide a variety of kits to chose from, one helpful tip was to leave off a lot of the trim, and change out the tile roofs for tar-paper or shingles, to help “Americanize” those European offerings. And whatever you do, don’t paste on those CinZano signs that I think almost every Heljan kit included…
Don’t give up too easy on the buildings. The roofing materials and roof outlines, the windows/doors , trim, and the coloring tend to be the biggest give aways of European origin for many structures. Fortunately other than roof outline those things tend to be easy to change even on a building already assembled. Sometimes the ground floor of a multi-story building can be salvaged. Just toning down the multi colors of some of those structures can do wonders.
I have some European kit houses that I thought looked so out of place that I eliminated them from consideration on my layout, even though their small footprint would have been perfect for the 1950s building boom neighborhood of “little boxes” that I was modeling. Changing the roofline from the original very steep pitch to something that looked more like a guy on a roofing team could walk up made all the difference – that and switching to our style shingles, removing excess muntins from windows, some goofy trim, and a plausible color for a sort of stucco sided building. But the big thing was that roof pitch.
But yes there are some that are so unusual or specific that they have little use on an American layout (except as noted in Cincinnati or Milwaukee or other city that had a heavy European influence at their times of greatest growth).
Dave Nelson
Dave’s got some great suggestions there. If nothing else, you have a BUNCH of great kitbashing materials[;)]
I’ve lived in Germany, traveled in Europe, and dabbled in European kits. In fact, just drug out some old pieces of knocked down kits I’ve had stashed for 40 years. I was pleasantly surprised that I could use them with a little work to place them on this side of the Atlantic.
The two biggest sources of compatibility with a Southwest theme layout is that Euro building kits often feature a lot of stone and stucco. Changes in roofing and details make a big difference with stone buildings. The stucco ones should work great for some of the adobe architecture. Add some roof posts protruding and chiles hanging and it’ll look pretty Southwestern in no time.
OK, by now you should have the modify trim/roof/windows to Americanize old-style Euro building kits drilled into your head (read that often enough in MR articles back in the day), but I now remember something else - I had a few Heljan and Vollmer buildings on my layout then, and IIRC while the industrial buildings looked OK, the commercial and apartment buildings and homes looked somewhat underscale - I had 2 of Heljan’s apartment/commerical 3 story buildings (complete with tile roof - I also added interior llighting by using the then Cutting Edge techniques of elevating a bulb above the first floor windows using a length of plastic rod, AND painting the interior walls of the building black to prevent light leaks - Living in the '80s!), and this 3 story building + peaked roof was not much taller than the Life-Like two story police station* - as you might guess, this looked silly. Oddly, their American architecture styled buildings looked about right in scale.
So, do a check against comparable structures to see if they look out of scale (let alone out of place), and then proceed from there.
*You were required by federal law during the 1980s to have at least one of the Lifelike Police-Fire-Bank structures, one of the Revell Engine House-Weekly Herald-Bakery, and a Plasticville structure of your choice - this was strictly enforced by the Hobby Police
Get the right buildings to fit the scene.
Rich
While utilizing the buildings given is the most frugal idea, In my opinion I would want believable buildings that fit the terrain, area, and era I was modeling.
I like to change out eras, and while some USA buildings are “era continuant”, others I swap out for the USA era I choose to “play” at the time.
European buildings would not do htat for a desert scene here in the USA, not even for a ghost town.
Now, As mentioned, you might be able to kitbash them and make something believable to the terrain, area, and era you are choosing to model.
It is Up to you. We don’t know your budget or skill level, and desires. But If you already knew what to do, you wouldn’t be here asking for advice.[;)]
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You may be able to use some of them. It wouldn’t be unusual for a city to have say a German building housing a German restaurant. My hometown of Richfield MN had one called “The Heidelberg” IIRC, with traditional ‘half-timbered’ construction.
Also, in rural areas, it wasn’t unusual for a bunch of German or French or whatever people to move to an area en masse. There are some MN cities like Hamburg or Young America that were settled almost exclusively by Germans, and have a number of German style buildings (especially in the oldest part of the towns).
Richhotrain has the right strategy, get the right buildings. Tactically this is not so easy. Having said this it depends also on what your building requirements are, residential, business, industrial, etc.
The architecture of large cities, even in the Southwest, tended to use European Architectural technology if the buildings were built up to and shortly after the civil war. Many of these buildings still exist. US factory building technology came into it’s own during the 1880’s. Many times it is the extra ornamental details that give away European verses US so consider how these can be toned down or just not used.
Factory buildings are especially this way. Breweries were money makers and the details were often quite elaborate on these, including multi colored brick, just like their European counterparts. Faller, Heljan, Kibri, Vollmer make beautiful factory buildings that are as much at home here as they are in Europe. Keep in mind when the buildings were built, for what purpose, and make sure they “fit” the scene. Lance Mindheim says to consider three things, Context, Color and Composition.
Context: does the building meet it’s purpose? Color: Is the building made from materials appropriate to the time it was built and with colors that would be typical of the period, Composition: would you expect to see this building in the scene or is it a stretch? Look at his layout and you see buildings and color that would not be expected in a scene from Ohio for example.
Hope this helps. Chris
My skill level is still beginner on a lot of this. I will be able to use a few mixed in with some of the other buildings I have for a town area and I’m thinking of another area of the layout for the mining area/ghost town and setting it more along the East coast maybe instead of the southwest.
Beginner has not much to do with it so much. Beginners are welcome!!!
Have fun, It’s a hobby after all!
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Every model railroad will ultimately require many buildings and structures. You wont be able to build them all at once- none of us can. Therefore, I would keep the older buildings and use them as stand-ins for that which will be build later on. Trade them out as you acquire and build more appropriate buildings for your Southwest theme. Having something in place will help you visualize the unbuilt items. Even if wildly absurd, labeling the mismatched building with an index card will help keep things straight.
Welcome to the hobby!
Don H.