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I spent the last couple of months designing and laser cutting some medieval/fantasy townhouses.

Still a work in progress.

The next stage will be etching some stonework and timber texture into the MDF and then I can paint them.

Pretty happy with the way the look so far.

Nice work. Any access into them?

Yeah.

Each level stacks on top of the other, so you can remove them to get access inside.

There are rooms and doors and stairs and everything inside.

These prototypes are missing it, but I have a hinge and latch door system as well. So you can open and close the doors for all the internal rooms.

Awesome, that's a big piece of good MDF kits - the ability to use the interior, etc. Nicely done!

That is a very detailed and impressive set of buildings. Would be a great set-up for small model count battles or even RPG games.Excellent work and thanks for sharing.

This is in no way a knock...but perhaps you have some interchangeable pieces for windows with broken slats, or broken sections of roof that have been repaired, etc? (i have no idea how hard this might be to design for a laser cutter, so take it for what it is worth) They almost look too perfect to be medieval buildings that have seen use.

is this a product someone can buy? I am a sucker for good looking terrain!

those look amazing.
I'd advise you to do a Google street view through the English town of Winchester - there's loads of these types of buildings which could act as more inspiration!

edwardmyst wrote:
That is a very detailed and impressive set of buildings. Would be a great set-up for small model count battles or even RPG games.Excellent work and thanks for sharing.

This is in no way a knock...but perhaps you have some interchangeable pieces for windows with broken slats, or broken sections of roof that have been repaired, etc? (i have no idea how hard this might be to design for a laser cutter, so take it for what it is worth) They almost look too perfect to be medieval buildings that have seen use.

They are a little pristine. But I also feel that a lot of the other fantasy/medieval scenery takes it a bit far in the other direction of cobbled together, dilapidated, or ruined. Got to give the medieval architects a bit of credit for knowing what they are doing.

Having said that I have been meaning to try and do a "ruined" version of the building. The roof slats can be broken away to expose the rafters and it should be easy enough to chip away the walls with a rotary tool. I'll have a play around with it and see what sort of results I can come up with.




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 Tiger9gamer wrote:
is this a product someone can buy? I am a sucker for good looking terrain!

Not quite yet. Because the models are quite complex it takes ages to put together the assembly instructions together. I'm working towards having them for sale, but it's a way off yet.

@Sacci023: I do really love these, and I also see your point. Starting fresh let's one decide where to place it in the realm of aged or not. Please keep sharing as you work on this and other things. I find a lot of inspiration in these types of things. Maybe share some of your thought process as you designed it (where your inspiration came from? Were these from photos? Real buildings? Anything you have time for).

edwardmyst wrote:
@Sacci023: I do really love these, and I also see your point. Starting fresh let's one decide where to place it in the realm of aged or not. Please keep sharing as you work on this and other things. I find a lot of inspiration in these types of things. Maybe share some of your thought process as you designed it (where your inspiration came from? Were these from photos? Real buildings? Anything you have time for).

They're not really based off real buildings exactly. I did a lot of searching through fantasy concept art and images of old European towns. My google search history has a dozen different variations of "medieval town", "fantasy town", medieval city". I started pulling out the elements that I liked from the photos, illustrations and 3D models - the way certain balconies and overhangs worked, the positioning and shape of windows, the slope of rooves etc. Once I had enough of the elements that I liked I started working them into the designs for the buildings. With the three townhouses that I designed the biggest issue was finding enough variety to make each design feel unique. Each has a different configuration, but I did have to repeat certain elements in some of them. The resulting designs are kind of a pastiche of lots of different elements from lots of different sources.


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I'm working on a smaller "cottage" sized building on a 15x15cm base (6x6") - the townhouses are on 15x30cm bases and the laster inn is on a 30x30cm base.
I made a prototype to test the design fit together properly and then made a second version with the stonework and timber etched into it which I am currently in the process of assembling and painting.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2iZitNC]
[url=https://flic.kr/p/2iZitP9]
[url=https://flic.kr/p/2iZmdpt]

Some more work in progress. I undercoated everything in white to try and cut down on paint time, but I am not all that happy with the white showing through in places. It looks speckled and dirty in places.
I'll have to go in with a fine brush and some proper model paints and clean up the imperfections. Still pretty happy with the overall design and fit of the model.

Just excellent pieces. I see what you mean with the white showing through. It's a pain, but multiple coats of different brown shades will cover and actually give a better wood finish.
I noticed the corners of the base have a design. Is that a locking mechanism with other pieces? Or just a design?

edwardmyst wrote:
Just excellent pieces. I see what you mean with the white showing through. It's a pain, but multiple coats of different brown shades will cover and actually give a better wood finish.
I noticed the corners of the base have a design. Is that a locking mechanism with other pieces? Or just a design?

Yeah. I was using kind of cheap paints because it had to cover such a large surface area. A few more coats and a steady hand should fix up the imperfections.

The base plate is designed to interlock with other street tiles and buildings. The idea is that you can quickly connect them all to make towns and cities and then pull them apart and rearrange them. You can see roughly how it works in the images in my earlier post. I'm still working on having enough variety in the buildings to put together a proper town. You can also remove the base plate with the interlocking pieces if you just want to use it as a stand-alone cottage.

I went back in and cleaned up the woodwork and freehanded some timber grain in there. It's probably not perfect, but definitely better than it was.
It pulls apart into three different levels. I'm going to try and furnish it with some tables and chairs to give it a bit more life.
It took much longer to paint than I expected. I'm going to have to figure out a better system because the other townhouse buildings are bigger and more complex than this little cottage is.

Super impressive!!! You should be exceptionally proud and I am sure in any manner you choose to make these commercially available you should see some success.

Great job!!!!