Changing European to American architecture

[Anonymous]

Faller and others make a lot of buildings with European architecture, many of which do not look right on American-style layouts. Does anyone know of any information about kitbashing and changing them to portray more American style architecture? Does anyone have experience with doing this? Specifically, I have a beautiful large Faller Bonn station that I would like to change to represent an American style station....

[dehusman]

Loose the steps. American stations you walk right out on the platform.
Put baggage doors (where ebaggage carts can roll into the building) in one end building for the baggage/express office.
Lose the eagles on the cornice.
Lose the "fence" on the roof.
Change the roof to a something other than tile.
A major change would be to lower the roof to lose the row of windows under the eaves.
I would also paint all the brick the same color (a light tan or brown) with a darker window trim color.

Dave H.

[Jetrock]

A lot depends on your prototype. Many American cities, especially older ones, have examples of very European-looking architechture.

In tune with the above post: The little fences on the roof can be removed, and the roofs changed to shake, shingles or other sorts of more American materials. One of my pet complaints is the angle of the roof--maybe they're more common in the North and East but most Western buildings tend to have gentle roofs since we generally don't get snow on 'em. One giveaway of European buildings is the asymmetrical windows--instead of a window being split into equal-sized panes, European windows tend to be off-center or split into three panes. Either cut out the mullions and replace them with strip styrene or use a Grandt Line window casting that fits the window to "Americanize" them.

I recently nabbed a bunch of European-style structures and hope to fit them into my very American layout--fortunately there are quite a few vaguely European-style and otherwise ornate houses, and tile roofs were pretty common here, so I'm halfway there already...

[vsmith]

Color can be a big factor too, American buildings are painted differently often not as boldly as european stations. US are often more earth tones. I like the idea of changing the roof but you might only need to repaint it to brown to get the same effect. European style architecture is found all over the US especially on the eastern seaboard and into the midwest. One thing I would suggest is to research train stations loking for similar type buildings and how were they colored.

OK I found a recent catalog photo of said Faller Bonn station: to change to US? a few pointers...
the building architecture as such is fine as is, this is typical of very large stations built during the end of the 19th and early 20th century. BUT..

if you want to depict a BRICK station the color pattern is reversed. with the darker usually red brick making up the walls (the tan walls shown on the most recent catalog photo) and light stone grey making up all the detail trim and entry portico ( all the dark brown bits of the walls on the photo)

If you want to depict a STONE building then the walls should be painted ALL the same color based on what type of stone you want, marble would be whitish, sandstone light tan, brownstone a dark brown, granite a medium grey. RESEARCH your colors BEFORE you paint! Try test colors on the inside of the walls to see if thats what you want.

If you want to depict a Spanish revival station common during the 1920s wall colors (tan and bark brown trin and entry are A-OK, but the roof needs to be red spani***ile. Technically the walls would be stucco with the brown trim and portico being also stucco or stonework.

the roof should be OK as shown DO NOT change to Shake, this type of large building would have either a metal roof or a slate or tile roof, NEVER EVER a wood shake roof on a building this big. For brick or stone buildings I suggest a grey roof to depict metal or slate. and it seams to me that US stations would only have one or two chimenys placed symetricly at the center entry block,

Window framess look OK but I would use a color based on the building type, red brick wall with white window frames is good, but white trim and sandstone walls wouldnt.

The steps up are fine if you want to leave them, many 19th century station had them but by the turn of the century the walk in station was more common, this was due to luggage being drug in by the traveler themselves and not dropped of by a carriage driver round back.

Lose the metal railing, very Euro. Lose the flags, US station only had one flag pole and it was often never on the roof like that, it would be out front of the station. Statuary on top of the portico entry is in keeping with the Beaux Arts tradition is US architecture of the 19th century.

Change the signage above the entry to US style station sign and lose the date sign at the top of the entry portico.

Been doing Architecture for 20 years now so believe me when I say READ READ READ find Architectures book IN COLOR at your library showing buildings like this and see how they look , use them as a guide for color and for detail find examples of large stations and then use them as guides also. Thats half the fun. Personally I think this station is just begging to be done as a red brick with light grey stone trim and entry, with white windows and a slate grey roof.

[jrbarney]

Don't know if someone from Walthers monitors this forum, but given that Walthers likes to show the European style buildings in their catalogues, one might think that it would behoove them to sponsor a contest for the best "Americanization" of the Faller kits they advertise. Then they could publish yet another book, this one being on building kit modification. [:)]
Bob
NMRA Life 0543

[Anonymous]

Thanks so much to all who responded to this query!!! As vsmith suggested, I have looked at American railroad station books and actually found in Burlington, Vermont, of all places, a station similar in many respects to the Bonn model. The painting suggestions especially have been useful - I tried a tan on an old architectural piece and it does indeed change the general aspect of the building.

Thanks again to you all!!

-John

[Anonymous]

Take off as much or as little as you like if you're modeling a fictional town. Milwaukee, for instance, has (and has had) numerous buildings built in a Flemish Revival style, among them City Hall (seen in Laverne & Shirley opening credits), and I'll refer you to an MR of a few years past that had a 2-page spread of an HO scale model of the C&NW station. Very Germanic/Gothic looking. Some of these building would not look out of place in the Netherlands, IMO.

[dknelson]

Windows are one difference - the muntins (is that the word) differ. Also their buildings tend to have more rounded roof lines
I think one of the biggest things is that European models are molded in such unusual colors that a few passes with a spray can really makes a difference
Dave Nelson