The little mansion

The little mansion was build around 2012 for my previous garden railway. 
It was my first building using styrofoam covered with a cement / concrete mixture and in fact it formed the base for my later buildings that were constructed in the same way. It was a very nice learning process. The building itself was loosely inspired to mid-European countryside houses, like those in the Ardennes / Elzas regions.

The construction does not differ much from the little lineside building so I won't good too deep in the details. I'll just mention the differences and some techniques I used, like the roof ornament.

At the bottom of the article you will find some pictures of the condition the mansion in February 2019, some 7 years after it was build and in which the building was outside all year round.

Construction

The first main difference is that I used much thicker pieces of styrofoam which make the base very solid. Here you can see some pictures of the very start of the mansion.

Base formed by styrofoam blocks and sheets

Applying the first layer

The stonework pattern of the walls was scribed in the half-dry layer of concrete mixture using all sorts of high tech tools, like an old screwdriver, a rusty nail, a piece of iron wire, tooth sticks or whatever else I could find and worked well. It was a lot of fun to do and you hardly can go wrong. But if you somehow do, just erase the scribe line with your finger gently and try again. 

Window sills, corner stones, settings, foundation stones and several the stones were painted in different kinds of grey to give it more variation and detail.  I used acrylic hobby paint from the DIY store. 

A plastic funnel that had the right size and from which the tube was cut of, was used as base for the tower roof. On the plastic I used a thick layer of construction glue to shape into roof tiles. This works about the same as scribing in the walls stonework, though you have to work a bit quicker as the glue dries faster. I also used a thick layer of construction glue on the main roofs, applied on the dry layer of concrete. The roof was painted dark grey and lines between the tiles were accentuated using black paint.

Stonework

Painting

Funnel and balsa bridging roof

Construction glue used for roof tiles

For the construction of the window frames I used (balsa)wood. This later turned out to be NOT a good choice, weatherproof wise. This is the same for the little bridging roof between the main roof and the tower, which base was made from 2 pieces of balsa. I'll come back on this further below.

The windows were not really cut out like the line-side building, but there was a rectangular space left open at the places were the windows were planned, as you can see on the picture below. 

The styrofoam in the window openings was painted black. Between the window frame and the styrofoam a thin transparent sheet of plastic was placed as glazing. Curtains were painted on the inside of the glazing using the acrylic paint.

Construction of the windows

The chimney was made from a piece of styrofoam, glued with construction glue to the roof. Stonework was scribed in a layer of concrete. Two plastic tubes formed the smoke channels.

Chimney

The roof ornament on the tower roof was formed by a piece of iron wire stuck in the top and three nice looking beading beads that were later painter black.

Roof ornament from beading beads

On both sides the roof got a roof molding made from styrene plastic and a piece of wooden 4x4 mm strip, painted with acrylic paint. This covered up the styrofoam at the roof sides, but looked a bit out of scale.

Roof moldings

Situation 2012

And the three pictures below shows was the building looked like when just finished in 2012, on the old layout:

 

 And be aware that this building was outside, the whole year round, year after year...

Situation 2019

And the pictures below shows how it looks like in February 2019, seven years later.
Although it looks nice from a distance a closer look quickly reveals several damages.
Some damages are caused by moving to another home but most of it was caused by weather influences. But besides the damages the overall condition of the building is not bad, considering it is outside the whole year!

Damaged roof and windows but overall not too bad

Some windows still in place

The most to be expected damages were the parts made from balsa wood. Almost all the balsa window frames came loose and disappeared or have rotten away. Some styrofoam chipped away at the bottom of the roof, above the windows, most likely due to transport. But the walls still look great!

Damaged and disappeared window frames

Not surprisingly the small balsa based bridging roof was damaged too. The balsa was completely gone. However, the ridge of this roof (sculpted from construction glue when the roof was still in place) still holds up, while the balsa is all gone!

The construction glue applied on the funnel that formed the base of the tower roof is peeling off.

The styrofoam from the chimney has partly disappeared. It became a bit hollow...

The walls that were on the north side turned green nicely. I actually don't mind the look of it.
The smoke channels from the chimney are gone. Both doors were made from styrene and looks still very neat. The acrylic paint on parts and roof has not faded. Some paint chipped off at the underside of the roof (where it was painted directly on the styrofoam). 

Love the look of the aged wall

Little damage above the door. Still the stonework looks great!

Some valuable lessons were learned during the build of this house but also seven year later while evaluating its condition.
- Balsa wood is going to be absolutely out of the question for other buildings; better use styrene instead;
- the concrete / cement mixture on styrofoam is a very endurable construction;
- details in the concrete (stonework etc) are still in good condition;
- parts made from styrene holds up very nice;
- the acrylic paint keeps it color reasonable well, especially on the stonework;
- the construction glue keeps up great when applied on the concrete but peels of from the plastic parts.
  
Somewhere this year I will gave this building some well deserved overhaul. Actually, I guess when I had bothered to do a quick check-up once a year with some little maintenance this building would have been in a better condition. So the final lesson: check and maintain on regular base prevent a lot of work later!  Just like an ordinary house ;-)