The Backscene

With the glue drying on my last structure, a timber and wriggly tin shelter for the linhay stoker, it will soon be time for all the pieces of the jigsaw to come together.

Inspired by my late friend Neil’s efforts on ‘Elsbridge’, decided that the plain light grey (an emulsion shade called ‘light drizzle’, very appropriate I thought) could do with some more detail on it.

Armed with the same ‘how to’ article that Neil used, I visited the local DIY emporium and returned with a couple of different green shades of tester pot to augment the ‘crocodile’ shade of the layout surround.

It’s fair to say that my artistic skills peaked in primary school, but undeterred, I set to and painted on some hills, plus one of the iconic conical china clay mounds so typical of the Eastern Cornish china clay landscape.

It all looked a bit bleak, but placing the buildings and trees where they are intended to go hides the backscene sufficiently to make it passable.

The scene should come together quite quickly now. Next job is to build up my ground layers using these cork tiles, lightweight, speedy and straight forward to use followed by ballasting the track. Then, with a relatively small area and inexperience on my side, purchased some rather nice grass mats in order for the greenery to come together. Will see how I get on.