Thank you all for your kind words. I am glad you liked my little step by step even though the building itself is rather ugly and nothing special. But at least this structure is a good example of how important details are. Without them, it would be the most boring structure in the world.

Talking about boring things, I already delayed ballasting the track on my layout for too long, so before I will build the next structure, I think I should do that.

Kurt you are doing wonderful work on the buildings! Keep in mind though that it will be the vegetation that will place it in Miami. No other place in America has the same type of native vegetation as south Florida.

Tyson, thank you for your advice. I am aware that getting the vegeatation right will be more difficult than doing the structures. I will copy what I see in the pics as good as I can. As a start I will order some palm tree kits from Hart of the South.

About 20 years ago I helped my youngest daughter make a diorama. Each of the kids in the class was assigned to make a diorama representing a specific state. My daughter decided that she wanted to do Florida. I cut a couple of plywood boards 12" x 12" and cut a hole in the center of one and glued the 2 boards together to make a lake in the center. I was working nights so I wasn't able to make it to the open house where my daughter's diorama was displayed with an A grade. My wife told me she overheard parents saying "there is a diorama made by one of the parents!" Actually all I did was cut a hole in a board and glue 2 boards together. I showed her techniques to make scenery and she did it. One thing we made was palmettos. I think palmettos are probably the most common vegetation in Florida and as far as I know nobody makes models of palmettos.

A palmetto is a short, stubby palm tree (palm bush?) that is 2-3 feet tall when full grown. The trunk is rough, brown, and kind of barrel shaped. What we did to make palmettos was to buy some of the smallest M E palm plastic trees. They may have been n-scale, I don't remember now. We cut the trunks down to about 1/2 inch in length. We then dipped the trunk into Elmer's white glue and dipped the wet trunk into sawdust. When the sawdust/glue mix dried, we repeated the process until the trunk had the fullness that we were looking for. She then planted the palmettos into the diorama.

I just "googled" palmetto and what came up was a much bigger tree. A related search yielded a dwarf palmetto which may be what we were modeling. I remember seeing them all over Florida when visiting relatives down there. I could not find a decent pic of them, but perhaps one of the members from Florida could post a pic of them. The last time we were down there was after the big fire that burned off much of the open spaces between Daytona Beach and Gainsville, and it may have been that we were seeing small palmettos that had not yet reached full height, but I remember seeing vast fields that seemed to be full of the little palm trees.

Russ, is this the kind of dwarf palmetto you are talking about? <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/39908/">http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/39908/</a><!-- m -->

Heart of the South makes very good kits of palm trees, among them a palmetto. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://hartofthesouth.com/">http://hartofthesouth.com/</a><!-- m --> You can get kits for trees or just the fronds. I think it should be possible to model these dwarf palmettos using the Heart of the South palmetto fronts. I definitely want to have some small palmettos (or dwarf palmettos?) on my layout.

cnw1961 Wrote:I am glad you liked my little step by step even though the building itself is rather ugly and nothing special.

On the contrary, it's beautiful!

Dave

cnw1961 Wrote:Russ, is this the kind of dwarf palmetto you are talking about? <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/39908/">http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/39908/</a><!-- m -->

Heart of the South makes very good kits of palm trees, among them a palmetto. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://hartofthesouth.com/">http://hartofthesouth.com/</a><!-- m --> You can get kits for trees or just the fronds. I think it should be possible to model these dwarf palmettos using the Heart of the South palmetto fronts. I definitely want to have some small palmettos (or dwarf palmettos?) on my layout.

The ones I saw in Florida were probably younger than the one in the pic. They just had a thick, rough trunk and fronds at the top, but none growing out the sides like the one in the pic.

kurt,as always,amazing buildings :jawdrop: ! you always seem to get them "just right" that they are totally believable,yet fit the scene perfectly.great job,and keep postin pics !--josh

Kurt, Russ is right about the palmetto. I wouldn't worry much about palm trees. The only place they grew on their own was on the beach. Some homeowners and business' planted them on their property of course, but a lot of those were not native types. The palmetto is not a tree it is a bush that mainly grows in thick thickets or bunches. Also look at the trees on Lance's layout, I didn't notice any incorrect ones ( did his research well ). The only native trees were some palms, live oaks, a couple types of cypress and slash pines for the most part. There are sea grape trees (a big bush really) on the beaches as well. By the 50's Austrailan pines and Melaluka (spl?) were imported and started to take over in some places.

Kurt, If you want some good "fill-in" palms try t019-60pcs Scale Scenery Layout Set Model Trees OO HO Item number: 260345688417 and do a search through their store <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://stores.ebay.co.uk/everydaygoodz">http://stores.ebay.co.uk/everydaygoodz</a><!-- m --> That will show up different types and heights available - good quality and excellent service - highly recomended. I have been a customer several times. Since you are in Germany can I also recommend SiSt trees who do some superb palm trees - they are a UK company <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.themodeltreeshop.co.uk/">http://www.themodeltreeshop.co.uk/</a><!-- m --> HIH Jack

Puddlejumper Wrote:

cnw1961 Wrote:I am glad you liked my little step by step even though the building itself is rather ugly and nothing special.

On the contrary, it's beautiful!

Dave

Dave, beauty lies in the eye of the beholder . I love this "ugly duckling",too, but I guess you got to have the twisted mind of a model railroader to call such a structure "beautiful".

Josh, thank you for your encouraging words.

Russ, Tyson, thank you, I really appreciate your help. Wandering with Google’s street view through the streets of the East Rail district, I found all sorts of palm trees (mexican palms, coconut palm, palmettos), but you convinced me to use only palms that are genuine to Florida. I will get in touch with Heart of the South to order two or three big palmettos (the same you find on Lance’s layout) and a lot of palmetto fronds to make my own dwarf palmettos. As far as I know, Heart of the South ships to Germany, so it should be no problem to get the palms, though it might take some time.

Jack, thank you for the links. If I can’t get palms trees from Heart of the South, I will have a close look at the Model Tree Shop again.

cnw1961 Wrote:Dave, beauty lies in the eye of the beholder . I love this "ugly duckling",too, but I guess you got to have the twisted mind of a model railroader to call such a structure "beautiful".

Josh, thank you for your encouraging words.

Russ, Tyson, thank you, I really appreciate your help. Wandering with Google’s street view through the streets of the East Rail district, I found all sorts of palm trees (mexican palms, coconut palm, palmettos), but you convinced me to use only palms that are genuine to Florida. I will get in touch with Heart of the South to order two or three big palmettos (the same you find on Lance’s layout) and a lot of palmetto fronds to make my own dwarf palmettos. As far as I know, Heart of the South ships to Germany, so it should be no problem to get the palms, though it might take some time.

Jack, thank you for the links. If I can’t get palms trees from Heart of the South, I will have a close look at the Model Tree Shop again.

Kurt, I would not be concerned about not using non native palms. If you found non native palms with Google's street view of the district, they were probably either planted by the business owner, or went to seed from some other part of Florida in a previous hurricane. As realistically as your models look, it probably won't look right to you if the prototype has Mexican palms, coconut palms, or other non native species and you don't model them.

Russ, I think you are right, I should not make it look more "miamiish" than the prototype. I got in touch with Heart of the South and the told me they’d ship to Germany, so it is settled I get my palm trees from them. Now I only have to decide what I want …

I spent the last couple of days ballasting and I started to apply ground cover to a small area to see, if the color I chose is right. With some grass added, it really starts to look like something – but if it is Miami, it is too early to tell .

I'm no Floridian, Kurt, but it looks "right" to me. I feel like I'm getting a tan just by looking at the picture.
That discarded tire is an especially effective touch, too.

Wayne

Kurt that is some beautiful work and i really like the scene so far!!

BTW, the container also looks very good, love the weathering and the patch on it