The House of Ill Repute[X-)][}:)] [{(-_-)}][}:)] [censored][}:)] got me thinking that there must be some very unusual business’s or Business’s that are housed in unusual buildings out there. I’m suremany of us would be very interested in what is out there.[:0]
As I said in the House of [X-)][}:)] [{(-_-)}][}:)] [censored][}:)] thread There was a small bar in Sheet Harbour on the Eastern Shore Nova Scotia where someone had bought an Oil Storage Tank (Several Thousand Gallon), which had never been used, and converted it into a bar called “The Tank”.[oX)]
You could consider modelling some re-worked warehouses now turned into luxury apartments - there’s a whole load of these in Bristol (UK), and there’s even a small preserved steam railway running over some of the old dockside tracks in connection with an industrial museum. There must be similar things in the US? How about some of the small RRs in New York which had all their trackage as street running and ran into/through buildings along their routes? Suppose (modeller’s license!) someone managed to re-activate one of these as a tourist line, you could run any number of small switchers, with a short string of cabooses as passenger transport. The Walthers “Oscar” and “Piker” cars could also be used. Would be an interesting model!
There are several car wash’s in Calgary with a wash bay in a building which is shaped like a large steel bucket. By the looks of it the bucket building’s bay could hold a large semi-truck.
That brought back a memory or two of a place I forgot about when I was a kid. It was a place in Richmond Hill (North of Toronto) on Yonge Street Called the Copper Kettle and yes that’s what it was a Giant Copper Kettle, Wonder if the Misses will notice if ours is relocated? mmmm…
Conversion of industrial warehouses to lofts/condos is happening all over–it has been going on for a while in places like New York and San Francisco but is just starting here in Sacramento. Many of these places were served by railroads until fairly recently so it wouldn’t be unthinkable to put trains on the tracks, and as there are plenty of warehouse models out there (and DPM modules for building them) they’re economical and require little conversion.
I’m fond of interesting small structures from the Thirties–weird little Art Deco things with odd shapes like gas stations and diners. They are well-suited for layout use, having a small footprint, and are nice to put next to large structures to give them a bigger feel. There are a few Art Deco kits out there, but they’re a natural for scratchbuilding from styrene as they were mostly angular and white/smooth in appearance–easy to build from sheet styrene if you have some good photos to work from. Some had curved sides–there was a good article in MR a year or two ago that featured an Art Deco car dealership with a curved wall, Deco details and glass-block windows.
These kind of buildings are well-suited for modern layouts, as many of them are still around and are in those older parts of town near the railroads.
Giant Orange orange juce stands were once common in California. The juce was sold from a large orange ball shaped building. There were always flat roofed open seating areas nearby so that patrons could sit in the shade.
The was one open in 1962 at the Intersection of Dixon Ave Weat and US Highway 40 (now I-80) The intersection was about 1-mile out of town. The structure was still there until at least the 1980’s. I saw one the remains of one from Highway 99 a few years ago, but I don’t remember where.
I read somewhere recently about an effort to preserve one, so maybe more info and some pictures will turn up.
Fergus: In Spruce Grove and Stony Plain Alberta (both on CN’s mainline west out of Edmonton) there are two government of Alberta Liquor stores that were converted into churches in the 1990s. While the buildings are pretty much ordinary warehouses, the idea could give you a scene to model perhaps. [8D] I might be able to scare up some photos if you are interested.
Your note made me think of the Oscar Mayer weinermobile that dates back to the 50’s - Oscar Mayer packs lunchmeat, baloney, hot dogs, has a series of vehicles to promote their name with market appearances, plastic weeny whistles, a short guy that used to be indentified as Oscar Mayer. Some ot that stuff must data back to the 30’s when people had too much time on their hands. In Los Angeles there was a Brown Derby resturant that had a corner entrance, that corner was shaped like a Derby. There were hot dog stands shapped like a hot dog in a bun with stools for a quick lunch, chicken resturants with a huge chicken head/beak on top of the roof. One resturant known for it’s baked goods Van De Camps had light blue buildings shapped like a dutch windmill, with blue neon blades rotating slowly all the time, it was a coffee shop/resturant, function like what they call a Diner in NJ/NY. There was a Cliftons Cafeteria at two locations in downtown LA, one hand a northwoods theme, the other, a south pacific theme, tropical fish walls, neon palm trees. It extended outside the building on the first floor, waterfalls, fake redwoods, pine or palms.
There were egg selling stands shaped like chickens along the highway. My favorite were the meat market, butchers shop with a painted mural of pigs and cows with halos going up to heaven, fish/seafood places shaped like huge fish or with a lobster roof.
When air conditioning was new, lots of bars, places in warm climates (desert) emphisized with Polar Bear or penguin figures, buildings that resembled a Igloo or iceburg, blue/white. Cocktails signs, Ice Cold Beer.
I forgot to mention the billboard 2-3 stories up in the air that had a real car lifted up, tilted on it. Yea, next to a car dealer in a showroom building. I used to wonder how they got that up their when I was a kid. The car may have been a Cadilac 1955-57 or so, or convertible.
Yea, bill boards help sell cars, even the pictures of new models.
There is an office building furniture supply store next to the Santa Monica freeway east of downtown LA, before Sears that has a couple of floors lit up at night where people driving by on the freeway can look in their showroom windows about 3-4 stories up.
Of course, re-use of old buildings is very common - I converted the Bachmann Plasticville automotive dealership into a carpet/rug showroom (painted, weathered, and detailed, it made a pretty good side carpet showroom).
One business I don’t see modeled much, even on modern layouts, is Self-Storage units, whether converted from old warehouses and other multi-story buildings, or built new (either as a field of one story multi-garage-doored units, or a multi-storied stucco finished building). These self storage units are practically everywhere around here, especially in industrial and commercial districts.
I think several Shurgard storage facilities around here have a lighthouse (with operational light!) in front, if you want something unique and interesting, yet prototypical http://www.rwmurray.com/projects/projpages/shurgard.html
One will definitely go on my next layout, right next to the 1 store stucco finished no windowed gaudy-signed strip club [^]
Had forgotten about those, remember them, probably stucco over wire frame, the drink perhaps like Orange Julius or Orange Bang!
The last of that style was Jack In The Box, all were shaped like a Jack in the Box box, two story, stand on the bottom with drive through and a huge plastic Jack In the Box clown with speaker for taking your order. Late 60’s to '75 before they started changing them, and MacD lost their arches. Taco Bell used to look more like a Mission in the 65-75, and of course, the hot dog drive through in a A frame style building, or IHOP in a larger A frame style.
Our MR should have instructions for making some of those buildings from scratch with paper/board, plaster or whatever. The scratch builds are always so huge, complicated, but I’d like to see some smaller projects, easier, I don’t need a depot, but could use a supermarket from the 50s in N scale. I could use a old Taco Bell, not a new one, even a old Dairy Queen, not a poor man version Dari-King.
I’d like to see some less complicated scratch builds, but it looks like just to get started, I’ve got to buy lots of stuff. MR Help!
btw - this started because of Wicked Wanda’s but there is so much more
I just want to figure out where my Orange Juice building should go, perhaps about the size of a Tangerine in N scale.
How about the Theme motel, Indian teepee style but the Teepee’s are motel cabins along the highway in any indian area, west or east along highway 20 or 13.
One of the most impressive buildings I ever ran across was a Mormon Temple in Oregon, south of Portland, lake oswego ??? area perhaps. I came across in in the woods like a magic castle, with Gabriel at the top. Took my breath away, so unexpected, I was staying at a hotel nearby in Sept. 90. One side was next to a major highway, like the one near San Diego, I-5 inland.
If someone wanted to challenge their styrene-forming skills, they could try modeling one of those 1950’s era “Orbit” gas stations with their huge curved-trapezoid overhangs…definitely distinctive architechture, and seen until fairly recently.
A minor sort of “structure conversion” for somene building a Twenties layout would be a speakeasy: an otherwise nondescript building, a restaurant or whatnot, with an alley entrance featuring a strong door, a couple nicely-dressed miniatures outside the door and a slightly-larger-than-your-scale figure in a suit standing in the door, with some light and perhaps a little pre-recorded jazz music coming from the door. Simple and relatively cheap (a bulb, a mini recorder, and a couple of minis) but it definitely adds some period atmosphere.
I remember when the McDonalds’ around here lost the arches. You could still see arched versions around Pittsburgh, PA in the late 1970s -early 1980s. They were all gone after that.
In North Sacramento there is a “retro-McDonald’s”–it was built only a few years ago but was designed to resemble the old classic McDonald’s with the arches.
Speaking of which, it’s perfectly appropriate to model a 50’s diner on a modern layout–there are enough of them out there–and Walthers does that lovely Mel’s Diner model that fits the role to a “T”–just populate it with the members of the local hot-rod car club
Back in the 70’s there was a manufacturer who made HO scale retro McDonalds.
Also in southern California we used to have these doughnut stores with a huge doughnut on top of the store. In fact a real doughnut would be about HO scale for the doughnuts that used to be on top of the stores. But then using a real doughnut would be a crummy way to make the model. LOL!