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The Bier Garten-1934

Next, I painted the beams of the completed building with an acrylic base coat of Americana / DecoArt Dark Umber, and came back to highlight the wood with Folklore’s “Aged Wood” – a nice warm gray with just a hint of brown.

Then, I tackled the painting of the plaster areas, using off-white and then an eggshell white to insinuate areas of the plaster that had been replaced and repaired over the years.

The resin roof pieces that come with the kit were painted similarly to the beams, with more light gray added to show the aging of the aged wooden shake shingles.  The columns in the front of the building were painted in a popular Dark Spruce, with an overbrushing of a lightened shade to show more wear and age.  I created a wooden sign for the front of the tavern, and glued on a white metal “ram’s head” that I found in a local dollhouse shop.  The yellow lettering was done in enamel, using a “fine tip” felt paint pen… they are expensive, but do great work!  The black metal sign rail was another white metal piece from the dollhouse shop.  The whole building was then given a dark umber wash to highlight texture.

I created the shutters for all the windows using little wooden square “tiles” that I found in Michael’s Craft Store.  I scored one side of each wooden square to replicate boards, and then added common style cross boards and metal hinges made from strips of pewter cut from a larger sheet.  The new shutters were chipped a bit around the edges to again show the effects of the hard weather of Bavaria, then painted the same shade of dark green used elsewhere.

Once everything was dry, I glued the roof to the building, hung the signs and set it aside to cure overnight.

The Base:

For the base, I poured plaster into the lid of a sweet-role container (see Digital Diamonds #5 for more detail), and scribed a simple rough slate etching to create the effect of a mountain town’s street.  Using earth-tone acrylic paints, I colored in the stone in a random shaded pattern.  Once dry, the basic building was then glued to the base with more Fabritac glue and allowed to cure.