One of our long time customers and valued friends Mark M shared some pictures of his progress on his French section on the layout. You can click on the images to get a larger view. Mark's work has a high level of detail, which makes it so much fun to study the scenes. We all can draw some inspiration of his craftsmanship.
Thank you Mark for sharing!
Here are a couple more photos of the French side of my layout. In the first photo, a SBB Vetron waits with a container train while a TGV Duplex loads passengers. The Vectron is a Marklin model and the TGV is a Lima (now Jouef) that I converted to 3 rail/digital. The station is from Vollmer (Baden-Baden), but I think it looks very French. The train sheds are from Faller and there are four of them connected together with extension platforms. This station was built for my 'old' layout and I modified it (very carefully as I no longer have the matching paint) to fit on my new layout. I also had to custom make some C-track sections to fit the geometry. The station had been sitting around two different basements for about ten years and was covered in dust. Fortunately, I was able to find all of the missing pieces and clean and repair it.
The second and third photo shows my theater showing...what else, but 'Murder on the Orient Express'. The signage is custom made using the DVD graphics with the size adjusted to fit via a color copier. Most of the kits on this end of town are Pola (now faller) that I recently assembled.
In the fourth photo a Mini Cooper has crashed into a safety pole. This is a Herpa model that arrived damaged, so a soldering iron was used to create some additional front end damage. First responders attend to mini patients, but it doesn't stop others from having lunch at the friterie. This is an Auhagen kit with French signage from Kibri.
In the fifth photo is the shopping area in the village of Bellevue. These buildings are all from Auhagen and the three on the right were export items sold in the Benelux with special signage. The two shops on the left have signage that were made using a color copier.
In the sixth photo, traffic winds its way around a flower box and flag pole. The flower box was made from a leftover building part painted a concrete color and the flag pole from round styrene, painted silver. The Crepe stand is an Oxford Diecast model sold by Hornby.
Still lots of detail to add and another side (Switzerland) to build, but progress at last.
Hope you enjoy these photos!