Berrigan's Boat Works Background Structure Evolves from Foscale Kit Winger Paper Bag Co.

Foscale's backdrop buildings are excellent offerings for my current needs as I am planning a shelf layout to be built along the walls of my crew lounge. The shelf will be 16 inches deep. Berrigan's Boat Works began with the Foscale Kit #17 Winger Paper Bag Company. A friend scanned the sign and I reworked it to name the structure after my friend, Gerry Berrigan.

I like the look of this stucture with its slight changes to the elevation seeing how the section to the lower left juts out a bit. The loading dock and its concrete supports are interesting as well and the triangular peak on the roof certainly adds visual interst.

A front view showcases the windows, doors and overhang. While this building really appeals to me, I want Berrigan's Boat Works to be a larger facility so I decided that a scratchbuilt extension would be in order.

Let's step back in time and review the making of the kit.
Here is the original set of instructions that came with the Foscale kit known as the Winger Paper Bag Co.

First step, brace the sides and paint the interior to help prevent warping.

Rather than paint the exterior walls, I gave a wash of white acrylic.
By giving washes, you can always add more until you achieve the desired results.
If you paint directly on, it is more difficult to remove the paint if you feel you used too much.

Paint the windows and doors.

Here's a great little tool for snipping the details off the sprues.

Very little residue is left as this tool allows you to get in really tight.

A trusty burnishing tool to press down on the lettering.

I like the desired effect.

A closer look at the burnishing tool.

Why not place the building with other background structures I've already finished?

Rearrange things a bit.

Yup, I really like the appearance of the Winger Paper Bag Co. now referred to as Berrigan's Boat Works.

I want a railroad spur to work Berrigan's and I thought that the short loading platform offered in the kit was more for vehicular traffic, so this interesting extension was born!

To create this add-on, I took parts from a variety of kits I had hanging around on the shelves. The wall section was easy...it is one clapboard wall from the Bar Mills' "I-Kit". I wanted unique doors and larger windows, so I robbed them from a Full Steam Ahead kit I will be building. The kit is the R.G, Shinnie Boatworks and I am not too concerned with one wall of that kit missing its windows and doors as that wall section will be the back wall of the structure and will never be seen by viewers in the room. The roofing came from leftovers in another Bar Mills kit and the beautiful loading dock is a Ed Fulasz plaster offering.

Some of the loading dock detail can be seen here. I haven't glued any of the detail parts to the model just yet...only placed it for the photograph. I will eventually create some steps to join the upper ramp with the lower one.

A 45 degree angle view of the completed structure. I really like the look of the extension as is fits in nicely with the original building.

I am really excited about how this amalgamation of kits and kit parts turned out and I know the Berrigan Boat Works will make a wonderful contribution to my new shelf layout! Have a great day!  Mike Hamer

To view a more in-depth account of this build at the Railroad Line Forum, paste the link below into your address bay above.

http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=27442