Saturday 29 February 2020

A Mediterranean Church

Here is one last building for my Sicilian village - a church.  Every Sicilian village has at least one church, and there are multiple churches in most towns, so I'd be remiss to omit a church from my village!

I carefully studied Sicily guidebooks, and even Google street view for several communities in Sicily to get an idea what a Sicilian church looks like.  The biggest and most prominent churches are mostly quite Baroque in appearance.  However, I found outside of the town centres, and especially out of the towns themselves, simpler churches could be found.

This church is from Empress Miniatures. I was very impressed with the service from Empress, I received the church just 7 days after I ordered it.  I don't think I've ever received a package that quickly from the UK.


The tower is completely separate.  This provides some flexibility in setting up the terrain.  The tower can be attached to the church or set somewhere else altogether.  


I used a sepia wash to try to match some of the colouring I saw on streetview.  I didn't get an exact match, and I was not very uniform applying the wash!


The tower has a few floors and a lift-off roof, so it provides a good place to put a sniper, or a FOO (forward observation officer, or artillery spotter).



Doors are a bit small, carrying on the tradition of wargaming terrain being slightly smaller scale than the miniatures.


The set includes a small statue of a saint and a crucifix to fit into the sconces on either side of the church doors.  


While browsing the shelves at Imperial Hobbies, I made an impulse purchase of some 4Ground church furniture, including an altar, a pulpit and a couple of pews.


I agonised over whether two pews would be enough, until I realised that I could barely fit even these 4 items into the church!




I also picked up a set of corners to match a set of straight wall sections I already had in my collection.






5 comments:

  1. Lovely walls, buildings and furniture, what"s not to like??

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  2. Very Nice! Any particular unit(s) you'll be modelling for this project?

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  3. Thanks for the comments, Phil and Tim. Tim - this is part of my Sicilian terrain for my Operation Husky project, so you can see the 1st Canadian Division and Fallshirmjager figures to see who will be fighting over it. Of course, now that it's in my collection, it could end up in all sorts of games - Wild West, Pirates, Horse and Musket...

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    1. Yes, I was just wondering if there were specific units within the First Division that you were planning on modelling your units after? Will we see a young "Squib" Mowat leading a platoon of Hasty Ps up Mount Assoro?

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    2. Well, that depends. I'm not getting to the detail of painting unit shoulder titles but I'm trying to get the vehicles markings accurate as best I can. So the infantry could theoretically be any unit in the 1st Division, but in my mind they are from the Hasty Pees, and the Vickers crew is from the SLI. But the CMP truck has the correct insignia for the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment, and the tank is COBAULT from the Three Rivers Regiment.

      The Germans on the other hand... I erroneously mixed up Fallschirm-Panzer-Division 1. Hermann Goering with Fallschirmjager, so I bought up and painted a bunch of Perry Miniatures fallschirmjager, only to find that 1st Hermann Goering PanzerGrenadier Regiment didn't actually wear fallschirmjager uniforms. So I've got a bit of proxy situation going on where the FJ are standing in for the HG Panzergrenadiers. It's confusing but once they're on the table, then they get to be whoever I say they are!

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