The Russia House

My last WW2 game, played solo a year ago, drove home my need for Eastern Front terrain.

So after a bunch of inquiries on Social Media I had quite a list of sources in MDF, resin, metal, and paper. The nice stuff was naturally expensive. MDF is economical but very lacking in character. Some recommendations were to buy MDF and then tart them up.

I felt that if I was going to do that I may as well just start with foam core and cereal boxes and give scratch building a bash. I mean even I can make some ramshackle boxes.

So I did. A simple house with small side yard and a slightly more complex shape with an out building.

Strips of cereal box were glued onto the foam core shell for the wooden planking. I did experiment with bamboo skewers to make a log house, but that way lay madness.

The thatching on the outbuildings gave me some issues.

Saved these heavy steel off cuts from work originally for my Space colony, but they've become very useful to brace things or weigh things down while glue dries.

Fences are coffee stirrers sliced in two glued to bamboo skewers. Chimneys are square pieces of balsa.

After priming with black spray they sat for 4 months while I painted Romans. Then Sunday, wanting to hobby but then having ALL of my energy drained away by discovering a leaky pipe, I spent an hour dry brushing them after dealing with buckets and wet vacs.

Four shades of grey later:

Then paint the thatch, some muted colours for windows, shutters and doors. Then flock. Small flower tufts are from Shadow's Edge.

So there you have it, a nice little shtetl on the steppes.