Scratch-built card and styrene structures (based on real buildings around London Bridge)

[grahame]

I don't recall a cycle shop under London Bridge Walk in the 1980s. The windows look more recent and newer fittings on Google Street view so I think I'll just add concrete panels in that area. Also the Needle Sculpture is relatively new but I can't remember what was there before. Again I'll leave it out and just put in some steps to make up the height difference I've got up to the walkway with the pavement sloping and joining up around them - if you get my drift.

 

The roadside shop kiosks/huts have been there for a whole (again if I remember correctly) and will add interest to the wide pavement. They should be fun to make.

 

G

[phil_sutters]

Did anyone click on the 'View film' button on the Eric Parry, Architects' webpage that was linked earlier? Although there was a bit of architect/critic spin talk, there was a good section with the master mason talking about the 'Needle'  http://www.ericparryarchitects.co.uk/projects/masterplanning/southwark-gateway-london.html   I appreciate that it is post-this era but if one is interested in the area it is worth a look.

Edited October 8, 2018 by phil_sutters

[grahame]

Apparently the needle sculpture (about 50ft long, sloping at 19.5° and pointing SW although the downward trajectory is supposed to be towards the site of the old London Bridge) was errected in 1999. The pics of its construction show the cycle shop as just a building site with the windows in the process of being installed. That certainly saves the need to make either, but finding out how that corner area looked in the 1980s is another issue.

 

G

[Number Six]

Going back to the glazed atrium, what is the glazing material please and how did you stick the glazing bars without fogging the transparent glazing?

[grahame]

Going back to the glazed atrium, what is the glazing material please and how did you stick the glazing bars without fogging the transparent glazing?

Clear plastic/poly sheets of various thicknesses. And Superglue. I think the fogging issue is a bit of a myth. I use it to stick in all the windows on my buildings and styrene strip to it for glazing bars - and have never had fogging. Another modeller I know has had the same experience - no fogging.

 

However use it sparingly - I use a fine sharpened stick (matchstick or cocktail stick) to apply it from a small puddle on a poly bag. If you get the glue on the part you want kept clear it can make quite a mess on it. I managed to get some on the atrium but when dry it can carefully be pared away with the pointed end of a sharp scalpel blade although you are likely to end up with scratch marks. A little Klear painted over the scratched area will help disguise/hide it. But real windows can be dirty and scruffy.

 

G

Edited October 8, 2018 by grahame

[grahame]

Just for a bit of fun for the evening I've knocked up one of the pavement kiosks located on the approach to London Bridge almost outside the No1 building. Google shows quite a few of them now but a 1999 photo shows just two, so I guess in the 1980s there might be just the one. It's quite small (under three quarters of an inch long) and made from plasticard. I guess I'll have fun painting and decorating it with sweets and tourist tat.

 

 

G.

 

 

[phil_sutters]

Just for a bit of fun for the evening I've knocked up one of the pavement kiosks located on the approach to London Bridge almost outside the No1 building. Google shows quite a few of them now but a 1999 photo shows just two, so I guess in the 1980s there might be just the one. It's quite small (under three quarters of an inch long) and made from plasticard. I guess I'll have fun painting and decorating it with sweets and tourist tat.

 

DSCN0070.JPG

 

G.

This is a modern version - in that area - so forget the mobiles and the bottled water - but I bet that bit of fake grass drapery was there in your time!

Edited October 15, 2018 by phil_sutters

[grahame]

I've been somewhat distracted by starting to put together an Academy 1:350 kit of HMS Warspite. Consisting of several hundred plastic parts (although not all are used) and having also purchased an after-sales PE from WEM with more than 200 etched parts (including a ships dog, cat and parrot) and a fine wood veneer deck it's going to be a long and slow build project.

 

Anyway back to London Bridge: I managed to take a few reference snaps while passing through yesterday and here's a few of them. Firstly the pavement kiosks:

 

 

The building on the other side of the road from No1. London Bridge that I'll need to make at least a corner portion of:

 

 

and part of the railway bridge/viaduct in that area that will need to be replicated. Unfortunately views these are on the opposite side from the viewing position so will be difficult to see but there some 'nice' run-down and derelict detail to model:

 

 

 

 

G

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Siberian Snooper]

I might have one or two photos of the other side of the bridge before they slid the new one into place, but I won't be able to have a look on my PC, until my father is released from hospital, time scale unknown at this time.

[Lecorbusier]

If I can find some time in the next fortnight I will see what photos of this area they have in the Harvard Library Collection ... they might have some late 1980s pictures.

[grahame]

I've been asked to demonstrate card building modelling at DEMUs Showcase exhibition in Burton on Trent next year and I've agreed. Obviously I'll be taking along a number of the structures featured in this thread to display as examples.

 

G.

[grahame]

Just a little cardboard engineering on the London Bridge project as I've been finishing the NGS Journal and have started making a kit of HMS Warspite. Anyway I've added the small storage box at the side of the pavement kiosk (can just be seen in the pic below) and started on the wide pavement area at the road junction.

 

 

With the longitudinal compression (and little height compression as that would make the floor and door heights too small) obviously the slope is exaggerated over the prototype. In order to try and disguise it I've flexed the pavement card, bending and manipulating it, to appear less severe. I found it difficult to find pics of how it looked in the 80s/90s (before the spike and bike shop was added) so I've designed it to take in to account the pavement slopes and help reduce their impact

 

The pavement covering is from Scalescenes (download and print) which I've used before. IMO it looks good and is improved by picking out some of the flags with a variety of contrast colours (which I undertook on my previous layout). The pavement will be glued to the road surface and then kerbstones added from painted square section styrene strip. The two rectangles near the edge are the drop sections for the pedestrian crossings although I've yet to add the flags and complete. 

 

G

Edited October 30, 2018 by grahame

[grahame]

The next building to make is Two London Bridge - directly across the road from No1. It needs to be a just the two front facing corner sides modelled (as in the pic below but not their whole length) as it will go at the back of the layout in the corner.

 

Obviously at this stage I only know the two walls position with the back to be curved to fit the backscene board, but that final fitting can be undertaken at a later stage. It's also interesting and potentially tricky in that between it and the high level Borough High Street/London Bridge road is a set of stairs that go down to the lower Montague Close road level (that passes under the high level road and in to Tooley Street). On top of the walls is an extensive decorative entablature with a deep frieze and fairly large cornice topped with an ornamental balustrade, with a further roof top 'apartment' floor behind it - however I'm not sure if this structure is a recent addition and was there in the 1980s.

 

 

Anyway I've been Googling and checking the maps facility and street view to see how it needs to be made to fit, and have drawn up a rough sketch of how I see it being made with the sizes required:

 

 

G.

Edited November 2, 2018 by grahame

[grahame]

The small piece of paper in the above photo is a full size template for the floor footprint. The first step was to cut three identical pieces of mountboard card to act as various floors in the structure carcass:

 

 

Usually I glue the floors between two plain flank walls but with the sides that do not need modelling being curved it will need a more creative solution to form a carcass that the two modelled walls can hang off.   

 

G.

[grahame]

And here's the carcass. The two flat sides (facing forward) are where the finished modelled walls will be hung on.

 

 

The thin outer corner columns are double thickness mount-board for strength. And the two angled centre internal walls are simply to hold the floors at the correct distance apart and provide a little rigidity. All the card parts are glued together with super-glue. The curved sections that will tuck in to the corner of the backscene can be trimmed to fit later.

 

G. 

[grahame]

I'm thinking that I'll model the feature walls simply from card rather than use brick embossed plasticard. Cardboard is easier and quicker to cut, especially windows, and this building will be right at the back corner of the layout over three feet from the nearest possible veiwing position. I reckon that a weathered paint finish should be effective enough at that sort of distance. The panel lines on the adjacent No.1 building are just pencil lines (rather than scored).

 

The architectural relief features will be included (they are mostly straightforward to model although the balustrade has me a little concerned) and hopefully should compensate for the lack of brickwork courses at that veiwing distance (and which are much smaller in depth).

 

What do people think?

 

G.

[grahame]

I've had to reduce the depth of the carcass - it didn't take long and that's the benefit of double checking fit/location at all stages of construction and keeping the structure simple. Now I've moved on to cutting the two feature walls and adding relief details:

 

 

I must get a new self-healing cutting mat and replace the one in the photo - It's looking a bit knackered and sad.

 

G.

[acg5324]

It looks you’ve been using mine!

[grahame]

Cutting card is quick and easy . . . .  

 

 

G.

[grahame]

In order to accommodate the stairs down to Montague Close I've included the pavement outside at London Bridge level and the bridge parapet over Montague Close/Tooley Street. You can't see the stairs down in the pic below (those on view are the entrance steps to the building) but they run down between the building and pavement/bridge parapet that the entrance steps pass over. The London Bridge pavement level entrance/exit to them is simplified from the real ones as the stairs turn through 90' for the top section which would add modelling complexity and prevent keeping it compressed.

 

 

G.

  

[grahame]

This is how it lines up against Bridge House and Bank Chambers:

 

 

G.

[Lecorbusier]

The next building to make is Two London Bridge - directly across the road from No1. It needs to be a just the two front facing corner sides modelled (as in the pic below but not their whole length) as it will go at the back of the layout in the corner.

 

Interesting ... it is also known as 

 

9 Montague Close

London Bridge

SE1 9DD

 

Its a shared Livery Company Hall ... my daughter is a head Chorister at Southwark Cathedral in the Girl's Choir who are sponsored by the Launderers ... there dining hall is in the building at the lower street level .... how do i know? I had to pick her up after a dinner she was expected to attend there following the Launderers carol service at the cathedral .... how the other half live!

[grahame]

The roof top structure (apartments?) looks rather modern - is it post 1980s? Nonetheless I started knocking up something representative although it's not complete or the parts fixed in place. At this stage I can always not complete it and leave it off. 

 

The balustrade around the top is concerning me - it's all those individual shaped baluster posts. I've nothing suitable in my stock of various N gauge fencing types and there was nothing usable on Shapeways (3D printed) that I could find. Obviously more thought is required but it is now the next pressing part of the structure to tackle.

 

 

G.

 

 

 

 

 

[Lecorbusier]

The roof top structure (apartments?) looks rather modern - is it post 1980s? Nonetheless I started knocking up something representative although it's not complete or the parts fixed in place. At this stage I can always not complete it and leave it off. 

 

The balustrade around the top is concerning me - it's all those individual shaped baluster posts. I've nothing suitable in my stock of various N gauge fencing types and there was nothing usable on Shapeways (3D printed) that I could find. Obviously more thought is required but it is now the next pressing part of the structure to tackle.

 

DSCN0170.JPG

 

G.

Yep ... I think so looking at the style.

 

The whole building was 'refurbed' in the 1970s with a modern interior threaded through the original warehouse fabric - but the rooftop looks later - but it might equally have had a makeover of the 70s original.

 

 

Hibernia Wharf has had a bit of a troubled history, having been built as riverside warehousing in around 1836, but was mostly destroyed by fire shortly afterwards. The current building is the replacement, by William Cubitt with two storeys of commercial chambers accessed from London bridge level, over a two storey warehouse at riverside level.

Unfortunately, the entire interior from the ground upwards was gutted in 1970, leaving just the facade, and the undercroft untouched – a technique sometimes referred to as “gut and stuff”, with replacement concrete walls inserted to replace the old interior.

The lower two floors of the building, along with the undercroft were then taken over by the Glaziers, and three fellow livery companies as their new hall.

Edited November 3, 2018 by Lecorbusier

[grahame]

It had a pitched roof (behind the decorative balustrade) in the 1920s presumably as part of the rebuilding after the 1851 fire. I've not found out when that was replaced by the current modern roof structure. It could have been at the time of the 1970s refurb or later.

 

I'll make the current roof as a separate sub-assembly that can be added if needed.

 

G.