Work in Progress: The Shire

Today I`m sharing a bit of work in progress on one of currently 4 Tolkien MOC's I'm building on, as I can slowly progress on each one when I come across some usefull elements during the never ending sorting story.

Now, while the other three are "pure" moc's I plan to complete in 2017, this one is one of the "Display builds" I love to make, to show off the existing Tolkien range sets.

Now, at first with only Lord of the Rings, The Shire was limited to only the Frodo's Cooking Corner polybag and the small Gandalf Arrives set - which also was the first set I bought after my dark ages.  With the first wave of The Hobbit came the excellent Bag's End set into the range, and around this I will be building the display.  Two more limited edition Bilbo's appeared afterwards, being the pyjama version with the videogame, and the blue coated one that is only briefly seen in the beginning of the first Hobbit movie came with the Battle of Five Armies Blue-Ray.

The build is based on a 48x48 baseplate, which is layered and reinforced as I tend to do.  Using regular bricks for the first layer, then Technic bars on top.  The engraved The Shire brick came from Mijn Blokje as usual.

I then laid down the plates for a small stream to show the rustic feel of The Shire, and I`ll be adding a fisherman or so there, as well as the first part of the road for the cart of Gandalf to travel on.

This road will bend off the plate again, on a raised level.

Bag's End is 'tested' on where it has to come.  I then attached small plates underneath to attach it to the base, and raised it in height by circumventing it with Technic bricks as well.

It`s then placed alongside the road, and the covering up of the build could begin.

Alongside Bag End a small "pit" will be created where the Cooking Corner will be placed.

The front and sides are slowly closed off, and these will be slightly elevating green knolls, to which afterwards details like fences, flowers, bushes and trees will be added.

The cooking corner is then placed in the pit, right in front a small green elevation on which another tree will be build afterwards.

The build as it stands now can be seen in the very first picture of this post.  Next I`ll be closing up the front first, then add extra texture everywhere before building and detailing the plate...

See you next time!