Spray Paint Those Kiddie Buildings Black

The good thing about having children is that you get to have their toys when they out grow them. I could never be bothered making buildings from scratch. (At school I failed Solid Geometry, Wood work and  Metal work due to my lack of empathy for angles - always preferring those free hand curves of creative drawing)

. Even the girlly wirlly pink and yellow buildings look fine as soon as they are given a spray black undercoat, to be later dry brushed grey with sample house paint pots. Above are a selection of Fisher Price and New Ray. ( The Fisher Price ones had been Alexi's. The paw print tiles on one of them are, admittedly, a little distracting. There are also a sprinkling of love hearts but perhaps these signify subtle irony when the buildings are taken over by the Bordurian Ministry of Love ( the secret police headquarters).

Below are the finished buildings. The general is a Lone Star Africa Corps figure. Next to him is a metal Stalin I bought in Kiev thirteen years ago. At ground level is a metal Lenin, also from Ukraine. The next two figures are Chinese plastics.:

                                    Below: Figures on top are Matchbox, Lone Star and DSG.

 Below: Airfix vehicle in service of the visiting Redian Black Shorts. The second vehicle is metal.

The Bordurian state is a dictatorship. It may be considered ironic that both Soviet and Nazi elements are pushed into service as Bordurians. However extreme right and extreme left have many things in common, something understood by George Orwell when he wrote 1984 and Animal Farm. Stalin and Hitler were also great 'buddies' for a while, carving up Poland between them.

Below: The finished stone barns dry brushed grey and given blue-grey tiles.