Lots of planning is required with a really small layout, you can't fix things on the fly. With a heavily industrial setting like I was trying to create it's worth spending some time making mockup buildings out of cheap thin card. Cornflake packets would be best but I forgot to save the empty ones.
I put this lot together an left it to look at for a few days to make sure everything looked OK. As an example, the building front left was to be back left but it looked too small so it moved to the front to hide the track entrance and it works better there. The only building with any detail at this stage is the middle right one with the arch because I was copying (sort of) a photo and since the track had to go through it it needed to be reasonably accurate. I had ideas for the finished buildings in mind, all I needed to do was build them.
The model under construction above is based on one I saw while on
my way back from a conference at the Aston Villa ground. The roof is
made of asbestos (Wills platic sheet) and lifts off. The prototype had only a single story but
I wanted more to avoid a backscene below the edge of the lid.
Not
all the buildings are built from scratch. I decided to cheat a little and
kit-bash a Ratio Boilerhouse kit. The chimney has to split at the
roof line so a short tube is inserted inside to support the break while thin elastic threads tie it to the ground. These can stay attached as they are streatchy enough to allow the top part of the chimney to be unplugged.
A simple card building at the end provides a little height for
what is a small building. The interior is a bit hidden as I weathered the
windows with thinned paint and the turpentine reacted with the plastic.
How do I close the lid ? Simple, all the buildings have removable roofs which pile up in the scenic area.
The result
was pretty good although I should have placed it on a coloured background
as it would have stood out less - the brickwork colour changes slightly
thanks to the transfer film. Copious amounts of micro-sol ensure good adherence
to the wall. 