The Rest of the West

Here's are the remaining four buildings that go with the Hotel and the Bank from earlier posts. If I was smart, I would've done all 6 at once but oh well... live & learn. Also, a lot of the techniques are the same as those two projects so I'm skipping through most of the detailed descriptions. Please reference those prior posts for a better walk-through.

I've cut out the floor shape out of foamcore, painted them black, then cut & glued craft sticks to be the plank floor. I'll scratch some extra wood grain in them & then used mixes of Minwax to stain them.

Starting from the top left going clockwise, we have: the whore house (2 story), jail, saloon, undertaker.

The undertaker floor looks a little funny because it will be holding support beams. It'll be built a little different than other buildings.
 


For the undertaker,  I started by putting in my support beams.
 
And then added thin craft sticks to be the interior slats. I framed up one wall, then did the inside, frame up the next, did that inside, etc. so that I would have more space to get at the wall I was working on. 


For the outside siding, I'm using strips of thin sheet balsa like I've done in the past & will do on the saloon & whorehouse. The walls for the rest of the buildings will just be made out of foamcore.


To get the jail walls ready for painting, I cut walls from foamcore, drew on patches of brick & ripped masking tape to hide the bricks from my spackling. 



I took the tape off after dry, did some sanding and got a pretty decent result.
 
(It was suggested to me that the outside pueblo would've looked better if I dabbed the spackle with a wet sponge before it dried. I'm sure he was right. Keep that in mind for your projects.) 



The buildings with wooden siding were done with cut 1/2" strips of sheet balsa & applied



Then used super skinny craft sticks & my hand held miter cutter to do the trim work


That miter cutter I have sure does save a lot of time compared to the saw & miter box I used to use. 

 Next is painting; did the jail first since that pretty much the only outer treatment it's getting. The base coat was heavy doused with PVA to help keep the spackle from chipping off over the years.
 
 
The dirty look on the lower part of the walls is my first attempt at using powder pigments. I dabbed on some acrylic gel medium & then brushed on the pigment using an old blush makeup brush.


Painted the whorehouse & saloon as well.
 
The hotel & salon roofs will be very similar: flat with balsa shingles.
 

The jail roof will be flat, with curved tile shingles.The undertaker roof is peaked to give it some unique-ness, and will be balsa shingles as well.
 

Here's the interior of the whorehouse -- it shows the 2 story layout a little better.
 

I had a bit of a hurdle coming up with clay tile roofing materials for the jail, but the terrain gods had pity on me & magically turned the tray my pretzel bagels came in into the perfect curvy pattern. I cut about 3/8" strips against the grain and layered them on a piece of cardboard cut to roof size. Painted & done.




And all the exteriors on wooden buildings have been sanded & stained.



Whores have a railing on their balcony now. I did this the same as the hotel -- drilled in pilot holes with a pin vice, glued the tiny sticks into the holes, then glued one long stick across the top.

I've also gotten a start on the saloon furnishings. Most excitingly the pool table. I made the body out of scraps of craft sticks. Drill the pocket holes with my pin vice, then smooth the edges & made the holes a bit bigger with a round file.
 

After staining the wood, I soaked a piece of green paper in watered down PVA & started getting it tight into the corners. Word to the wise: cut your paper with round corners instead of square corners like I did. It's harder to fix after the paper's wet & half stuck.
 
To help encourage the edges to stay, I brushed on pure PVA under & on top of the paper.
 

Paint up some beads for balls & my dudes are ready to play.
 

Here's the saloon layout so far. The bar has a hinged part for easy walk-through.
 
I made this little sofa from scarps of balsa & popsicle strips shaped by a Dremmel. Some scraps of foam core made cushions then wrapped cushions with wet paper & glued into place
 

Got my jail cells together using latch hook rug canvas & cereal card. I ended up cutting out every other horizontal row of the weaving because it looked too cluttered
 

A few paintings, signs & curtains have been printed & put up. Still more of the first two to go though.
 

Wanted to print out the saloon logo as well, but it got screwed up I just hand painted it instead.
 

I also made some round, cushion seatees for the whore house.  They're made from 2 circles of insulation foam, wrapped in wet, PVA soaked paper with a black wash over the top.
 



The whores have been prettied.
 
The undertaker has some coffins on display for testing out.
 


Plus a recent customer in back. He's just sculpted out of clay with wet paper draped over him.
 

Outsides have been based. This time I used a mix of sand, a little bit of tea, small rocks & cinnamon. No cumin nor onion powder, which was a good call. It was a lot less putrid of a smell than the hotel.

Jail's got some guns & a stove, desk & a bunch of wanted posters.
 

Saloon has the pool cues up, bottles, 4 loose chairs for game play and a shotgun.

That's pretty much it; here are some final pictures:

 

 

 

 

         
Thanks for viewing- until next time! :)