I finally finished my farmhouse for my Normandy terrain. I based this roughly on some of the amazing scenery built by David Wright in his book “Making Rural Buildings For Model Railways”. This book is a must read for anyone looking to build their own scenery. I followed all of the suggestions in it and it improved my little farmhouse no end! I have tried a couple of manufactured buildings from different companies and nothing measures up if you have the time and the energy to scratch build your own structures. Your creations will also be what you want, to your designs, and fit perfectly with your other scenery and models. I think making your own stuff is the most rewarding thing about this hobby!

Using a foam board base for the structure, the key is to give it a coating of glue and modelling clay or ready made filler or plaster. Stonework is then carved into the buildings skin in whatever texture you like. Regular bricks or rural stonework or anything that looks the part. I picked up a $15 electric engraving tool from eBay (China) which speeded up this process a great deal. Hand scribing individual stones is a time consuming effort, but well worth it. Roof tiles were made out of Christmas cards, flashing from aluminium foil. I did buy the chimney pots (another suggestion from David Wright) but everything else is easily found and inexpensive to pick up at the art shop or stationery cupboard.

I was very pleased how this turned out, now i need to finish the rest of my farm, including  a little stable with a corrugated iron roof, an old shed with a hay loft and a big barn. Also need to pick up a vintage tractor from somewhere and make some hay bales. Will probably make a farmyard with walls and find some animals to scale to finish the scene. If you want to make your own buildings for wargames i suggest you check out David’s book as it is all you will ever need! I put the new farmhouse on the edge of my table just so you can get an idea.