9 results found for 'Roye England'

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 1 Introduction

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 125 (2001)

    p.43

    The first in a series of short articles taken from th emodelling notebooks of Roye England, founder of Pendon Museum

    Tags: buildings, scenery, scratchbuilding, techniques

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 2 Stonework

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 126 (2001)

    p.97

    We begin our journey through Roye England's notebooks with some extracts that describe the embossing and colouring of stonework. The subtlety of texture and colour that Roye managed to impart to his model stonework was one of the defining features of his work, but it was achieved only through a great deal of experiment and frequent over-painting and/or removal of colour until the right effects were obtained. First of all, Roye describes the embossing of stonework on the walls of the Old Rectory from Liddington in Dorset, a model that was started during the Second World War, but never completed. Although it is not mentioned in the notes, the material that Roye would have used would have been thin white card - probably no more than 0.5mm thick. This was the standard material that he used for basic construction in his architectural models. He had purchased £10 worth of the brand known as 'Scholastic' in Bristol at the start of the war. Ten pounds was sufficient to purchase a surprisingly large quantity of card in 1939 and the last sheets were not used up until the mid-1980s!

    Tags: buildings, scratchbuilding, techniques

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 3 Brickwork

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 127 (2001)

    p.130

    In the previous extract from Roye England's notebooks, his basic techniques in modelling stonework were described. In these notes, he describes some of his methods for modelling brickwork, starting with a description of how to set out the bonding pattern of one of the most common styles seen on buildings that were included in the Vale Scene - Flemish bond - where the bricks were laid alternatively as stretchers (lengthways) and headers (crossways). I am also including some notes on weathering techniques as applied both to areas of brick and also stonework.

    Tags: buildings, scratchbuilding, techniques

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 4 Timberwork

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 128 (2001)

    p.171

    Timberwork features in a range of different uses within the buildings that Roye modelled for Pendon - both for basic structural work and also for surfacing. In these notes, a range of applications are illustrated, starting with some comments on the structural timbers in the magnificent model of the barn from Badbury Farm.

    Tags: buildings, scratchbuilding, techniques

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 5 Windows

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 129 (2001)

    p.209

    In this set of extracts, Roye describes some of his methods for producing windows. The buildings that he modelled for the Vale Scene generally feature two styles of window - casements and sash - and whilst the majority were made with wooden glazing bars, some of the buildings he modelled featured leaded lights. The notes below concern each of these variations. First, Roye describes how he made case ment windows for cottages in the Chapel Group.

    Tags: scratchbuilding, techniques

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 6 Interiors

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 130 (2001)

    p.261

    One of the most celebrated facets of Roye England's modelling was the attention that he paid to the interiors of cottages. This, like so much of his work, was truly innovative and gave, of course, full scope for him to indulge his fascination with the incorporation of detail into his models. His notes on modelling interiors run to more than 30 pages, from which I have selected some extracts that describe some of the fittings to what is perhaps his best-known interior, the front room of White Cottage on the corner of the Chapel Group. The most striking feature of these descriptions is the relative simplicity of the methods used, but, as those who have seen the interior of this model will probably testify, the composite effect is a quite stunning portrayal of a commonplace living room of the 1930s. There is, perhaps, a wider lesson here - that simple methods are often just as adequate as more elaborate approaches in attaining high quality modelling. First of all, Roye writes about some of the larger items within the room.

    Tags: buildings, detailing, scratchbuilding

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 7 Tiles and Slates

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 131 (2001)

    p.303

    Roye's techniques for modelling tiles and slates were broadly similar, the key differences being in the differing dimensions of the two types of roofing and their thickness, terracotta tiles being generally thicker than slates. Here he describes the basic task of marking out and cutting tiles for the models of the farmhouse from Badbury Farm and one of the sheds attached to the smithy from Childrey.

    Tags: buildings, scratchbuilding, techniques

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 8 Weathering Tiles and Slates

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 132 (2002)

    p.9

    Another of the secrets of Roye's success as a modeller of buildings was the skill that he brought to the task of weathering his models. At with so much of his work, his careful methods were the outcome of careful observation of the original buildings, matched with a great deal of experimentation into ways of replicating the colours and textures that he noted. In this extract I am reproducing some of his notes on weathering of slated and, particularly, tiled roofs. The roof is an important facet of a model building since in most viewing situations, it is clearly seen - often from above - in a manner that is seldom true of real buildings. Modellers, therefore, need to pay particular attention to the realism of their miniature roofs and careful weathering will certainly help. The notes in this article deal solely with the visual qualities of mosses and lichens, (rather than the effects of soot or airborne pollutants) but I think that modellers will find that if they replicate these techniques, the roofs of their models can be made to look really natural. I have retained Roye's simple descriptions of the different growths that he noted on the roofs of the cottages in the Vale of White Horse, rather than substituting their botanical names. These notes actually originated in a lengthy letter that Roye wrote to me in 1983 in response to a request for guidance on weathering roofs for a Pendon model I had under construction at that time, but subsequent research has located the same information in the full records from which these articles are drawn.

    Tags: buildings, weathering

  • Roye England's Modelling Notebooks - Part 9 Plants and Flowers

    Stephen Williams, Roye England

    Issue 133 (2002)

    p.60

    4mm

    In this penultimate set of extracts from Roye Englad's modelling notes, we focus upon one of the most remarkable of his skills and perhaps the facet of his modelling that attracts most attention and admiration from the general visitors to Pendon - his ability to model plants and flowers. Here. perhaps, we find the ultimate expression of his skill in observing the real world; in developing - by experimentation - ways of capturing the qualities of real plants in miniature; and the painstaking application of those methods to produce miniature gardens of unrivalled finesse. However, not all his miniature plants were modelled exactly. Where the plant itself offered little in the way of distinctive structure, more impressionistic approaches could be used to effect. Here is a short explanation of how he modelled small white flowers - the species not being recorded - for the front garden of Middlecot in the Chapel Group.

    Tags: scenery, techniques