ChrisN

Mikkel,

Brilliant, and well done.  They do not look like a first attempt.

(Have I said this before?)  If they are London Plane you will have to clear up the sticky mess that forms underneath them.  

14 hours ago, Mikkel said:

Just seen this. Good to see some more of Andrew's period figures! C126, you could do a diorama for them, e.g. a family gathering around their means of transport, or similar.

 

I'm doing a street scene at the moment and was wondering if I should include a couple of Andrew's ladies promenading. Although on reflection I don't know how much of a walk even the more liberal Edwardian dresses allowed for?!

 

I think I prefer Solomon's second attempt. Although less daring at first sight, the colours and the looks are really much more, well, sexy. 

Mikkel,

I think if you look at the films of the day the ladies carried on as much as they do now.  They wore these dresses continually so were used to them.  In 'Grandfather's London', photos from 1875,  there is a picture of a lady carrying her child.

Reason for Edit: jadies to ladies

5 hours ago, C126 said:

 

Dear Chris, Thank you for your kind words and much-appreciated advice.  Figure-painting is something I have put off, but these were just too good to resist.  I assumed one did the 'big colours' first, and finished with the detail (the smaller the area the less likely one was to slip).  I have noticed both how my eye-sight would benefit from an illuminated magnifier and my hands from being steadier now I am past the half-century.

 

Another concern is trying to keep the layer of paint thin enough to maintain the exquisite detail.  I was sorry to see the primer 'reduced' some facial expressions.  Do people prefer slightly thinned enamels rather than acrylics?  Another aspect to explore...  Many thanks again.  Neil.

Neil,

I use acrylic primers if I am brushing and try and brush off any excess.  I try to spray though, if I can, using Halfords finest.  If you look back in Mikkel's blog, and look forward you will see quite a lot about figures and painting.  There is some info about figures on my Traeth Mawr thread, just go page by page until you see a picture.

26 minutes ago, C126 said:

Unable to resist the allure of a well-dressed lady, I splashed out on Andrew Stadden's figures - who needs boring brick-work to finish a layout when you can feast your eyes on a crinoline or silk topper? - and they are stunning.

 

 

These are my favourites at the moment, with the fullest skirts.

 

 

 

The above is the full set, sorted by skirt size, three at the back being more of an Edwardian outline.  And here come the gentlemen, sorted into coat style (frock coat single-breasted, double-breasted, tail-coat, 'sack coat')...

 

 

I am the figure top row, 2d from right, to have a cane added.

 

My photography is hopeless, and adding a coat of primer does not enhance the detail, but as you can see I have started playing around with sample 'slabs' of colour, an acrylic set picked up during the virus confinement at Wilko's.  How you gents can get such precise detail on your figures I know not, but I hope with practice I can get some sort of decent finish.

 

My partner bought me this for my birthday:

 

 

... which goes into even more detail than the 'joint volume' I cited earlier.  If anyone has any queries they think might be answered by this book, please do not hesitate to ask me to check.

 

Quite where I am to put these figures when finished, on a 1970's B.R. (S.R.) Goods Yard, I have no idea.  But they were too good to resist when I had a few quid in my pocket.  Hope this is of interest.  Best wishes to you all.

 

I hesitate to comment on Mikkel's thread about people, but I will.  They do kook good,  A word of advice, it is better to start with the faces and then work outwards as it is easier not to get paint on where you do not want it.  I am not sure the figures at the back are more Edwardian, they just do not have such a big crinoline.  I saw aphotograph recently of a lady, a titled lady, from the 1860s who had a very long dress that obviously was made to go over a crinoline, but she was not wearing it.  What is surprising is that she had her photograph taken like that.  I like it that you have a figure of yourself.  I have a couple, and of my wife, but neither look like me.

Mikkel has written in this blog an in his thread on how he paints his superb figures.  My technique is to use a large magnifying glass with built in lamp, then  putting both elbows on the table I hold the figure in one hand, the brush in the other and I touch at least my little fingers together.  This way if I shake, both hands shake together.

Keep up the good work.  You will just have to make a diorama, or have them in a corner looking lost.

Brilliant Mike, and so well executed.  I do like the fact that you make it out of parts; it does seem the best way to go.

I feel we should have a race as to who can produce a coach in the shortest time.  Let me see, my quickest build is two coaches in six months!  (We will ignore all the others that are not finished yet.)  

Simon,

If I remember correctly, (Ha ha), in Mikkel's blog about stables someone said the average life of a GWR horse was six years.  Even more pies!

It was said when I went to a Shire Horse place near Cromer many years ago that the reason we have so few heavy horses and the French still have quite a number is that we do not eat them, well, not knowingly.

5 minutes ago, Mikkel said:

I'm not sure if it's possible to dig up photos of the same dropping from multiple angles, especially 1900s ones! 

 

Incidentally, it seems that the so-called "horse manure crisis of 1894" in London and New York is an urban legend. Apparently it originates in a 2004 article which makes a number of unsubstantiated claims. Lots os websites mention the crisis, but if you look at the accompanying photos they do not in fact show horse manure, just muddy roads, trash and roadworks.

 

It does appear to have been a topic of debate in the first Urban Planning Conference in 1898.  I thought the conference was in 1895, but it must have been postponed.  

The other issue was how to feed that number of horses.  I thought the debate was about that too, as there were so many horses it was thought that there was not enough farming land to feed both the horses and the people.

Hazardous waste, not if it is used for fertiliser, so says HMG.  I can imagine though that leaving it at the roadside in bags is probably not allowed, but if you asked they may give/sell it to you.

As I type this there is an advert popping up at the bottom of the page asking if I have enough horseshoes.  

Mikkel,

This one has been edited with modern shots alongside.  Just after 3:42 as the shot changes to on the bridge, two men go past in white jackets.  The second one appears to have a spade.  White jackets usually meant that they collected poo of some sort.  The night soil men who went around with a cart and shovelled the soil out of the outside earth closets wore white jackets.

Mikkel,

Excellent!  It looks superb, and that horse looks quite embarrassed.

You probably know that in London, and probably other places as well there were men who went round with a bucket a spade to collect horse manure.  I am not sure if the council employed them or if they were self employed and had their own customers.  On one of the old films, of Tower Bridge, I think, it was certainly one of the bridges, a man with a shovel and a bucket walks past the camera.

Brilliant, yet again.  If it is summer the grass is likely to be more brown than green in the yard as it is likely to be fairly dry, unless of course they wash the yard.

8 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

But were those carriages that were in regular service? They may have been out of use anyway and only condemned because there was motivation for a stock-take. There may have been some financial advantage to writing down assets to reduce the Cambrian's value on amalgamation. 

Oh yes, they were in regular service!

Mind you the GWR condemned most Cambrian stock.  It was all fairly well worn.

This may be true for the GWR.  When the GWR took over the Cambrian, (or was it the other way round?), they immediately condemned some four wheel coaches as they had rot in their corner posts.

On 09/03/2021 at 15:39, C126 said:

 

I am much obliged to both of you for the 'Grandfather's...' and 'Dickens's...' refs., and heartily recommend both 'Images of Lost London' and 'Panoramas of Lost London' - neither cheap but worth every penny.  Clothes took a long time to die: the toffs passed them on to their staff, who sold them on to clothes merchants, which ended up in Petticoat Lane, and eventually they were worn in the slums of St Giles, or shipped out to the Empire.  Most women of all classes wore both corsets and crinolines (and later bustles instead of the latter).  I am rushing this at work, but can recommend several yards of books of contemporary accounts, and especially the wonderful 'London In The Nineteenth Century' by Jerry White.  There are refs in the latter that will keep you reading for the rest of your life, should you be so distracted.

 

Sorry, can post more inspiring titles later if of interest.

I purchased a copy of 'Lost London' at not too exorbitant a price, half the original I think.  Now being a Lundun lad I find it fascinating, as I have walked some of these streets, and even driven around some of them.  Some have gone completely, others just the buildings have changed, or not.  I will get my lads to look for a copy of the volume on the East End for Christmas, somebody must have taken a picture of my dad, surely?

3 hours ago, Mikkel said:

 

What a resource those sites are. Of course they are all dressed for the occasion, but if I understand correctly railway journeys were also cause for dressing up.  Looking at the Edwardian era, I have noticed this style in some Edwardian station photos, a rather different appearance from the cheerful bright dresses we normally see modelled. A big city phenomenon, perhaps.

Mikkel,

My impression is of looking at Edwardian photos is that the blouse/shirt and skirt was a very common choice for day wear.  To this would be added a jacket and coat to keep warm.  It was a style that became popular through the 1890s, but before that it was mainly dresses.  I am not sure how often women changed through the day as well, eg, blouse and skirt morning and going out, dress for receiving visitors for afternoon tea.  Again, I think this habit was dying out.

I am not sure when exactly the wearing of mourning clothes died out.  Earlier in the era it was very common, and for different periods of time.  There was a comment in a book somewhere from a young lady that the styles and colours this year were really nice and she hoped no one she knew would die so that she did not have to go into mourning.  There are not many ladies seen on layouts in black, although purple was also a mourning colour apparently.

When the Third Class Cambrian Saloon is finally built it will be populated with ladies from the local Temperance Society.  They will mainly be in dark clothing some of which will be black.

The Stadden range is mainly coats or jackets and skirts, (Mainly?  4 out of 5.), so not too bad.

Disclaimer:  I sound like an expert but I am not really.  Like most things with me my knowledge is fairly superficial, my comments have come from the observations of photos.  

Here is the link to The Barrington House.  They say their site is still under construction but it has not changed for years.

This is the Roger Vaughn collection.

Mikkel,

Just seen last Friday's World of Railways Newsletter, and this blog was in it!  Just followed the link and here I am.

Well done!!!!!

I am not on my own computer at the moment, (I hope to get it back as my grand daughter has returned to school and hopefully does not need it any longer for online lessons), but I have a link to Roger Vaughn who used to have a website of old Victorian photos and in it has photos dated by year from about 1850 or so, so that you can see the fashions year by year.  Also There is a site called Barrington House, which I think is based in the US but it has yearly fashion plates, again from the 1850s.  These I think are English/European as they differed slightly from US ones and are very useful.

The Stadden figures in crinolines are very good, and he has some sitting down.  @5&9Models has some early Victorian figures as well to make a change.  His blog is also worth following, London in the 1850s.

I do model 1895 and some ladies have been converted to look the part, mainly the 'posh' ones as they can afford high fashion, the others remain Edwardian, and I ignore that.

Interesting thought.  Many years ago, I heard a football supporter saying that when they went to away games up north the fashions were about 9 months behind those of London.  (Nowadays as every town has the same shops then that is not the case.)  The further away from London that you go, and lower down the social order, the more you can justify 'out of date' fashions.

Finally, and I have said this before on my thread, in 'Grandfathers London', which is a book of photographs of ordinary people in 1875, there is a lady half on the photograph in clothing of the 1850s, without the crinoline.  I understand that the second hand, and third, fourth and fifth hand market was quite strong so you can, to a point have older styles.

I really should be building coaches but often get distracted with figures, and then they talk to me and I have to write down what they say!  Once I get some buildings up I shall have to have a Blog to reveal what they said.

8 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

Maybe the Cambrian worked differently but usually the rule was no promotion without relocation.

He worked his way up at other Stations and became a Station Master at Fordep.  He then moved to Traeth Mawr, which is where he had been born, when there was a vacancy.

3 hours ago, Mikkel said:

 

Good thing the locals at Traeth Mawr didn't hear that! There is an opening here in case Mr Price is interested, although perhaps he would consider it an insult? Perhaps it is also a little late in his career at that point!

 

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/OKUAAOSwOZJgQf5-/s-l1600.jpg

 

Mikkel,

I am not sure, without looking, how senior a Class 4 Station Master is.  Mr Price is a Silver Band Station Master, and there are only gold bands above him.  He also has a house, a very nice one, er, when I get round to building it.  Also, he joined the railway so that he could be station master at Traeth Mawr, and this was in 1864, three years before there was a Traeth Mawr station so I doubt he will want to move.

Thank you for keeping him in mind though.  

5 hours ago, Mikkel said:

 

Thanks for that, I'm a great fan of travel literature so it's a bit disgraceful that I haven't read this one yet. I will now! I see it is listed as non-fiction, but a quick perusal of the Darjeeling chapter suggests that Twain has placed no restrictions on his wonderful mind 

 

 

 

What a strange fate at that time, when such animals were completely new to Europe. Less exotic these days, last time I saw a rhino was on the SVR!

 

@bcnPete and @Dave John, many thanks! You mention the letter. It is very tempting to start a collection of old GWR letters, forms etc. Some of them tell interesting stories, even if they are sometimes intriguingly hard to decipher. There are usually examples to be found on ebay. But I can see it getting out of hand very easily.

 

I saw a letter on EBay from or to a Cambrian Station Master.  As hard as I tried I could not decipher the writing, then I realised, it was in Welsh!

The question is, when did they get to Farthing?  They certainly never got to Traeth Mawr, at least not in 1895.

I am not sure where I got this, probably from Castle Aching, and I think it is an LNWR van.

Remember Barnum's motto was, 'There is one born every minute.'

There are other elephant and railway pictures in 'Branch Lines around Acsot' by Middleton press, as the Chipperfield Circus, I think, used to winter off a now non existent siding off the now non existent Ascot West station.

Mikkel,

Just brilliant!  Not just the modelling but the thought that changed the story into reality.  I love the use of the mountain troops.  I do spend time looking at model figures to transform them into pre-grouping railway characters but this is another level.  It encourages me to redouble my efforts.

I look forward to the recreating of other stories.

Actually, your building looks really good, and has been done really well.  The building in your picture is more like the condition I saw buildings in, but that was 100 years later.

Are they wearing the mid Victorian equivalent of a hard hat?

You have to watch these computers.  They always give me trouble when I show them I am in control.