Structures for Monk Subdivision - The French Canadian Cottage

In early April, I started to build the structures that would be installed in the future farmstead scene on Monk layout.

As expected, it was a no brainer and should be a traditional French Canadian cottage. These distinctive houses dot the province along the St. Lawrence Valley and are unique in North America, making them perfect to set the layout in the right geographical area at a glance. Armagh is full of these houses, though most of them have been renovated on the cheap, losing their attractive trims, their elegant casement windows and their wood siding.

A typical farmhouse in Armagh

This specific model is based on an extremely widespread prototype that can be found in Quebec City area. It is 24' x 24' and these were built from the early 1800s up to the early 1900s. The window location on gable end is typical of  the South shore along the old NTR track and the lack of dormers is generally associated with poorer and more recently settled areas. Dormers were indeed generally a sign of prosperity and would be added later on when the attic was converted to living space.

Villa Hamel-Bruno in Quebec City(source: Trip Advisor)

The highly attractive curved eaves were inspired from a South Asian-inspired fad that was very popular with villa owners from 1790 to 1850. Regular people started to apply it to every building, including French houses, barns, sheds, churches, schools, mills, fatctories and whatever you can think of. In old 19th century contracts, it was referred as "Chinese roof" but that expression is no longer used and almost nobody is aware of the blue chinaware influence it came from.

Orientalism was, unsurprisingly, very popular in New France and endured until the late 19th century. You often find very old Asian wallpaper in farm houses with pagoda and traditional Chinese landscapes (foggy hills with trees) with many often made and imported from the Orient.

Back to the model! For the sake of making the future farm scene looks larger and deeper, I'm experimenting with a 1:100 house. The barn will probably be N scale so I can park a pickup and a tractor by it with N scale cattle. If it works well, I will build the rest of the civilian buildings at a smaller scale and keep 1:87 for trackside structures.

I started by drafting my house on Evergreen novelty styrene sheet. These houses were so much codified you can build one from the ground by only having the ground plan.

Cutting the walls from Evergreen Novelty siding sheet styrene

Siding is distressed and windows added later for ease of construction

Details such as casement windows were made by heavily modifying Tichy sash windows. Decovative trims with fronton, a very popular style in Quebec, were also added. Most of them find their origin in pattern books written by American architect Minard Lafever. His books were quite popular in Quebec and provided a lot of reference pictures and template for woodworkers. Local architect Thomas and Charles Baillargé used extensively this style, particularly Charles who had an obsession with Neo-Greek architecture. In Armagh, most household were too poor to afford elaborate versions of these trims, so they simply used planks cut with a fronton but omitting the mouldings altogether.

Making Neo-Greek casement window trims from bits of styrene

A completed gable with its two attic windows

I've developed my method of assembly structure over the years and can do it fast nowadays. Never forget your internal bracing!

In need for a roof, the house is almost complete

Gluing soffit (tongue-and-groove siding) ad fascia is key to realism

As I did with the speeder shed and Langlois station, every bit of styrene has been distressed with a razor saw to make the weathering process easier which should be quite straightforward. I repeat myself, but texturing any surface you plan to weather is one of the most crucial step in making your modelling shine.

A typical French Canadian cottage ready for paint