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I've had this sheet of 2'x3' cobblestone textured vinyl sitting in my closet for a few years begging to be used for something. I picked it up for a few dollars in a clearance bin at Hobby Lobby after Christmas. It's a mat for setting up miniature dioramas , but I'm going to cut it up and make distressed and decaying roads out of it. The mat looks like this:



Yesterday while I was at the grocery store I found some sheets of foam-core in the school section. It was undamaged, and best of all, it had "ghosted" lines creating a grid of 1/2" squares all over it making it easy to measure out and cut everything straight with almost no effort. I cut that one sheet into a variety of interesting road shapes. At first I thought 1 sheet would not make very much road but was surprised once I started laying these out in different ways. This is plenty for my table.



I cut strips out of the cobblestone mat that were slightly smaller than the road piece. I was worried that I would not have enough mat to cover all the roads. That's when I got the idea that the roads would be decaying, destroyed but still usable streets.



I then started cutting the strips into smaller, jagged pieces which I hot-glued to the foam-core road pieces:





Then, using a mixture of gray paint, cat litter and water, I filled in the gaps between the cobblestone bits with it. Once these are dry I will start painting the streets. Everything is still downstairs drying right now. I should be able to post the final pics tomorrow.

Looks interesting, good luck on the final results.

I saw this and basically wanted to squeal in delight.

I like it. Not a huge fan of foamcore, I really dislike the give it has as a terrain piece. However, this looks great. Good idea.

FYI: That vinyl will react with certain sprays/primers and give off tons of fumes and remain "sticky" indefinitely...

I used it on some terrain pieces once and scrapped it due to this...


be sure to seal it with wood glue, etc. prior to any spraying...

Thanks for the tip. I was going to use a clear acrylic matte finish to give it a paintable surface. Now instead I will use a watered down glue instead to cover the vinyl first.

Thanks for the tute, I think I'll try this out!

I really like where you're going with this. The only caution I would give is that be careful with the amount of adhesive you use to affix the mat to the foamcore. Foamcore has a tendency to warp.

I would suggest 1/8" MDF. You can get a 2'x4' 'project sheet' of it for about $5 at Home Despot or similar.

Otherwise, its very cool and look forward to seeing the results!

-Ratchet

A few of the pieces did warp but only slightly. I am going to paint the underside of those pieces to warp them back the other way and should even them back out. I would have preferred doing them on hard-wood planks but just didn't have the cash this week. I have enough vinyl sheet left over to make a 2nd set on hard-wood if I decide to.

Looks good to me. Seems like you are pretty lucky when shopping to!

Good news. Painting the opposite side of the foam-core did warp it back into being almost perfectly straight. Now to add some color and dry-brush it.