Even More Buildings (and a Scene or Two)

The Station Building

Even though the layout is small, there are a fair number of buildings. Apart from the fish co-op, the next most important building is the station building [Photo 1]. It’s the railway’s headquarters on the line. The platform was marked out on the baseboard and traced onto paper. This was then cut to use as a template and transferred to an old piece of timber that was big enough to use as a platform.

I wanted to give the platform a look of a moderately cheaply-built platform constructed by a private railway that, in its day, was trying to look fancy. I figured that the station building could be stone with a brick-faced, earth-filled platform for the passengers. Over the years the platform had the sandy surface replaced by tarmac. Wanting to keep my costs minimal, the platform was covered with tarmac and the brick facing came from the Scalescenes range. I had previously purchased these for a project a number of years ago. I usually spray the sheets with a matte varnish before I use them. Once the platform was complete, it was screwed into position.

The station building is a Peco British outline ‘Manyways’ kit that I had found at a second-hand stall years ago. I thought that I could use it somewhere on a previous layout. It turns out that it was waiting for this layout. It was painted using the dry-brushing technique that I used for the dock walls. I used craft acrylic paints for this. What I didn’t do was prime the plastic first. This was a mistake and it should always be the first thing one does before one paints. I knew better, but I still missed this step because at the time, I didn’t think that it would matter.

For a long time not much happened to the station building. It is located at the front of the layout and every time I worked on something at