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Nostalgia, it's not what it used to be...


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It's not only the kits that get collected in my little world...

 

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As with the kits, if the paint or glue is old, mint and unopened it stays that way. I've amassed enough used old stock to keep me going without breaking into the collectables.

 

Parts of the collection have been out on show in the big wide world now and again. A favorite event, now sadly over, was the Arlesford Museum for a Day show. A hall in Arlesford, Hampshire was taken over for a day during summer with all kinds of collections, Triang Meccano, and me with my Airfix!

 

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All the different collections were well received by the general public and an enjoyable day was had by the exhibitors as well.

 

Happy days.

 

Tony.

 

 

 

 

Edited by TonyW
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You've got that little box of Airfix paints in glass phials (Mini test tubes) I see.  When I recalled having that in another thread, posters responded it must have been a Humbrol set!  Thanks for the confirmation.  Those were the only colours i had apart from silver and brunswick green in the glass jars, until airfix brought out tins (and i later found their paint was better than Humbrol too).  Everything had to be Airfix until i was ten or so as that was all the local newsagent stocked.

Cheers Will 

PS there is still an old toys show in Alresford, but not tied in to D-Day, mostly trains and Meccano though, as you say.  It's nowadays at the big school down the hill from the 18th century community centre where it used to be.  At Christmas the same organiser(?) often puts a vintage toys display in their local library shop front.

http://www.alresford-toy-trains.org.uk

 

Edited by malpaso
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8 hours ago, stevej60 said:

That is out of this world,I swear I was fumbling in my poket for one and six for a poly bag kit when I realised it's not 1973 anymore,and I'm very annoyed!

Not as annoyed as the shopkeeper who would have been expecting you to hand over 17.5 new pence for a Series 1 by then!  

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A few more to keep the thread rolling...

 

This small settup was the first one after the yellow paint had dried on the pegboard. The sudden realisation that I had a whole room to fill as I wished was a bit overwhelming at first. By the end of the week, the room was too small!

 

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Here's a setup from the blue end of the room. Nice, but I preferred the yellow.

 

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And a couple of posed builds, all done as I would have built them as a kid. Possible less fingerprints on the canopies this time around though....

 

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Tony.

 

 

Edited by TonyW
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Superb! Simply superb! 

 

It took me a long time to realise that my "take" on the hobby is exactly the same as yours. It wasn't so much about building replicas of real aircraft, and more about the actual kits themselves. Although my collecting revolves around the late 70s and early 80s....but that's the key I suppose as we're preserving those special early modelling days of our youth. I have exactly the same plan as you have so wonderfully demonstrated in this thread, except my kits are mostly Matchbox, Airfix, Heller with some Hasegawa and Novo thrown in. Frog had disappeared from the shelves when I started buying models.

 

I'm extremely jealous of the Humbrol paint rack....I would love one of those! Like you, I collect the paints and glue too. Love this thread! Thanks for sharing!

 

Best regards;

Steve

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Wow and wow with a bit more wow! Love it. Every photo you have posted… I had that one, and that one, and that one, and always wanted that one…. Memories of my youth were not always good, but my memories of modelling were always happy, which is probably why I was eventually drawn back into the fold. It's surprising how a photo of Humbrol paint tinlet display can make you feel.

Thanks for posting Tony.

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It very much reminds me of the back of a local tobacconist newsagent 'Peri' which was owned by a modeller called Mr Dowling who was always there cheerfully puffing on his pipe while his staff sold the sweets and cigarettes at the front. Even the pegboard I seem to remember was yellow. He didn't just stock Airfix. It was tiny little Aladdin's cave of models some quite esoteric and unusual. I still sometimes have very pleasant dreams that I'm back in his shop. But wake feeling slightly frustrated that I can't buy any of them! The shop is still there but has long since been transformed into the usual bland 'Spar' convenience store. The back of the shop is now stocked with frozen products and no Airfix magazines sit on the magazine rack only the likes of Bella and Chat.

 

I think the idea of your own personal model shop is a really nice idea. Mr Dowling had his own and if or should I say when I win the Eurolotto. I may set aside a room in my new mansion laid out like a model shop. After all my wife fully intends to a mini clothes boutique in her wing of the mansion!

 

Well we can both dream.

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I'm not alone then.

My manshed/modelling shed has a similar

setup with old boxes & models etc on the

walls but on a smaller scale (ahem).

I have Airfix & Frog but am now turning towards

old Japanese kits as I like their artwork too.

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It's just like looking in the window of The Handyman's shop in Blyth that used to relieve me of all my weekly pocket money when I was a young'un.

 

The more I look at these images, the more I think that the collection should be preserved for posterity, as soon there will be a generation of modellers' who will never know the pure joy of spending a Saturday morning in a local model shop, with money burning a hole in their pockets, then choosing a kit and trying to have it built before the Sunday afternoon war film on the good old black and white TV.

 

The model of the Silver City DC3 brings back

happy memories of building that very kit with my Dad because he flew in the real thing many times from Newcastle when traveling back to his work when his leave was up.

 

Happy days indeed.

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Ah Mosquito/ME262 dogfight double, first kits I remember painting with my dad using the Airfix glass bottle paint. I recall ‘duck egg blue’ for the Mossie undersides with grey/green uppers. Strange considering my father had seen the real thing twenty years before! Accuracy, who cared, it looked great to me, even then I just knew the Mossie was the greatest aircraft ever.

Am I the only one who now has Ron Manager voices going round my head “plastic kit hmmm, smell of glue hmmm, proper modelling hmm”

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If some is good, more must be better!

 

Here's a collage pasted together, showing the main display area with yet another Airfix themed display. It was always difficult getting pictures framed up, my camera at the time wouldn't open up enough to get everything into one shot. Sorry it's a bit indistinct, the picture is a copy of a copy.

 

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When I started chasing down the Airfix kits I remembered having as a kid, the Roy Cross years, I soon found stuff I had never seen before. I soon found myself going further and further back in time. 

 

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I started building display items to show off the boxes as a shop might have done in the day. The more I did, the more ideas came to me. It opened up my modelling like you wouldn't believe!

 

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Although it could get a bit overwhelming at times and sometimes caused my wallet to have a few frightening moments, it was all good fun. Things never got stale for me, I would pack up a display of one sort and bring out another. One week I would be building a ship or two, the next it might be railway based. Long may it all continue.

 

Tony.

 

 

 

 

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20 minutes ago, old thumper said:

I think what you have created here is really an art gallery. At least in any other walk of life that is what a mixture of paintings and sculptures would be called. 

It's a gallery for sure, if only a virtual one at the moment. I sometimes think it's a bigger version of laying out your toys on the front room floor as a kid. 

 

It's ever expanding. Once you discover something like an old FROG model of a Javelin for instance, you start looking around for stuff to display alongside the model and box. This can lead you to period books and magazines like The Aeroplane or Flight, with their stunning covers. Inside those you might find a cutaway of a Lightning that immediately sets you off on a display arranged around that! It's never ending, and highly enjoyable.

 

This stunning advert for the Gloster Javelin from an issue of The Aeroplane, got me all fired up for the mark. Before I knew it I had an original ID poster and a 1.48 scale desktop model to sit alongside it! I'm doomed, I tell you!

 

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I make things difficult for myself by wanting a mint, unmade kit with a built version alongside it. To afford to do this with some of the rarer models I buy up scrap or incomplete models and over time assemble enough bits and pieces to build what I want. 

 

Tony.

Edited by TonyW
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totally awesome and 100% brilliant

 

this has just given me a head rush and time warp back to the memories of the model shop in Camberley (Surrey) back in the early '70's.

 

a brilliant post - and a great reminder of how far modelling and choice has come since the good old days

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