I desire to build the Artz Lumber Company that was designed by the late Art Curren. I have the original article . I thought this would be a great structure to build for fun this spring. The Atlas Lumber Yards are still easy to obtain; however, I am having diffuculty obtaining the farmhouse structure that was suggested in the original Curren article. I believe the farm house was made by Con-Cor. I cannot find it anywhere through internet searches as to who might have picked up the kit to reproduce. Does anyone know who is producing the original farmhouse that was made by Con-Cor. Building the Artz Lumber company structure without that farmhouse would be difficult.
Does anyone know any information as to whether that kit is still in production and who manufactures it? I would appreciate some help.
Art was my favorite MR author, and I’ve planned on making Artz Lumber for the last 25 years or so. Last spring I took the plunge, and started collecting the kits. Like you, I could not find the farmhouse. It is no longer made by any manufacturer, and I scoured eBay for a couple of weeks with no success. So I looked through the Walthers’ catalog to see if I could find another kit close enough to the original. There were a few that held promise, but while searching, I ran across the LifeLike General Store kit (Cat# 433-1351). It had more parts that gave me more options. It took considerably more work to make it fit in, but I feel it was worth it. If you don’t go with the General Store, Model Power has several farm house kits that might work.
The irony of this is that Art Curren was a kitbasher.
So if you REALLY want to follow Art Curren and can’t find that exact building, do exactly what he would have done and substitute another building. Model Power makes several farmhouse type buildings, as does Pikestuff.
SUGGESTION: IF picture of farmhouse in original article could be posted here, some modeler may have farmhouse or a kit, that would work. My 2 cents…Old Tom aka papasmurf in NH
The Artz Lumber article was in the December 1986 issue of MR. However, the farmhouse kit was not made by Concor, at least not at the time of the article. The American Farmhouse was made by AHM and was their kit number 15303. A picture of the kit may be seen at the following link: http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/ahm-ho-american-farm-house-nos-76147518
They are not made anymore but they do pop up on ebay often. Search “house”. Many of the unassembled kits that were distributed by Revell and AHM come with farm outbuildings and seem to fetch a premium price. I’ve seen others selling this house already assembled.
This same house is also sold under the name “suburban house”. That would work too since that version does not have the wrap around porch.
You may want to see if AHM’s “aunt millie’s” house could work as a reasonable substitute. That kit came in several versions, and undertaker and hardware store I believe too. That basic house may still be available through model power, although likely under a different kit name.
My suggestion would be that if you can’t find the exact model you want then why not try scratch building. Evergreen Scale Models sells styrene clapboard, Tichy, Grandt Line and others sell windows and doors, and there are suppliers for shingles. You can scale the building by using a door (usually 34" x 80") as a point of reference to give you the relative sizes of the walls, windows etc. The end results can be very rewarding.