Hollow Brick Discovery

During my recent vacation trip to San Francisco I took a walk around the neighborhood near our motel.  At the northeast corner of Vicente Street and the Great Highway in San Francisco's Outer Sunset neighborhood I discovered this beauty:

Built in 1927, it has a fascinating history which I will leave to the reader to discover at this link.  What caught my eye was the large brickwork.  I've always thought the brick used in AHM's structures was oversized.  It is, for standard brick, but not for "hollow brick" or "hollow tile", a material that came into use in America in the 1920s but has long since fallen out of favor.  I've mentioned this material in a previous blog post on the meat market mock-up. 

This building stood out in a sea of structures known for their sameness.  Most of its neighbors are wood and stucco, all on narrow lots, shoulder to shoulder*.  But the big draw for me was the brick itself.  I had never seen it first hand and it wasn't until reviewing my photos from the trip that I realized what I had captured.  The brickwork, Deco detailing and Spanish influence seen in the porches and tile roof all combine to make this a stand-out structure worthy of prime real estate on any 1920s era model railroad.

*To be fair, there are some real architectural gems in those row houses, many with Art Deco and Streamlined Moderne styling; some preserved but most modified over the years.  See this wikipedia entry and links within for more information on the development of this area.  Blog readers might find the "Carville" link especially interesting.

Hammersmith

A recent trip to San Francisco gave me an opportunity to visit a lesser-known landmark, the Hammersmith building.  Located at 301 Sutter Street, it was built in 1907 just after the 1906 quake and fire that destroyed much of San Francisco proper.  It has retained its historic architectural character despite having been home to a variety of businesses over its nearly 120 year existence.  The current tenant is Zoox, using the building as a "rider lounge" for their robotaxi service...I'll return to that shortly.

Out of all the beautiful buildings in a city packed with fantastic architecture, why visit this structure?  Because Scale Structures Limited produced an HO scale kit for this ornate pile that has always caught my eye and I wanted a closer look at the prototype inspiration.  I say "inspiration" because while the SS Ltd model looks like the Hammersmith from three feet away, the details are less than perfect, by a wide margin.  The general proportions are off as well, with the kit including a brick extension on one side; a concession, perhaps to the "millwork" kit they offered which provided a rudimentary interior with floors and staircases.  

The major discrepancy, besides the brick extension, is the arrangement of floors.  A post card from the time of the building's opening describes the layout; a first floor showroom, mezzanine, second and third floors, and a basement (with a description of what was included on each floor, though I don't need to go into those details here).  The kit only gives you a very tall first floor with a second and third floor above that.  The mezzanine windows of the prototype were replaced by some ornate panels in the kit.  From the outside it is clear that there's a floor there - though no longer open to the first floor below as a mezzanine would have been, by definition.  A large rosette adorns the ceiling of the "mezzanine" level and I suspect it would have been visible from the showroom.

Enlarge the image for a closer look at the Mezzanine ceiling rosette.

I don't intend this post to seem like such a harsh kit critique of an old kit.  To be fair, I can imagine that SS Ltd might not have have the most accurate source material to work with back in 1982.  And, at that time, prototype fidelity mattered less than the general impression, an idea I still endorse.  None of this matters if you simply want a lovely Art Nouveau structure for a corner location.  The castings, while not accurate to the prototype, are still in keeping with the style.  However, it's worth saying that if a person wants an accurate replica of this "jewel box", they may have to do some significant kit modifications or start from scratch with design software and a 3d printer.  

Anyway, back to Zoox.  The company was offering free rides to promote their service in the city.  My wife and I had never been in a self driving car - in fact, it was my first ride in a fully electric car of any sort.  The experience was surreal; familiar yet novel.  It was only a short tour around a couple blocks to demonstrate the car's capabilities, but it was comfortable and we felt safe.  The car navigated the traffic, including pedestrians, without any difficulties.  We came to see the historic building and ended up riding in a futuristic car.  Go figure.

Your blogger, buckled up for safety.  Note the MUNI "sunset" scheme hoodie.
More on that in a future post...

Photo Finish

The photo studio section of the Ensminger Brothers building is mostly complete, lacking only window glass, final weathering, and perhaps some signage.  A fence running between the brick building and wood entry will be added when the structure is installed on the layout, but I'm getting ahead of myself.  Here are some progress images showing how I built the roof, added shingles and painted the structure.

I used dense file folder material for the roof panels.

Normally I don't like Campbell shingles but they work well here.

I chose an aged white and slate blue for the walls and trim, with a dark mudstone for the stairs and a lighter mudstone for the shingles.  The shingles and stairs received a dark brown wash while the walls received a mudstone wash.  I used charcoal black for the roofing paper, then lightened and streaked for an aged appearance.  

In the third image you can also see the brick walls have received a mortar treatment.  I sealed the paint then applied joint compound, pressing it into the mortar lines.  This can be removed carefully from the surface of the bricks using a damp sponge.  In this case I wanted a sloppy application as seen on the prototype so I was careful to not wipe away too much.  This stands in contrast to the clean look of the facing brick, though most of that brick is hidden by the veranda.

Speaking of the veranda, it received some paint as well.  Moss green for the base coat (applied with a spray can) and cactus green craft paint.  In this image the parts need a second coat of the cactus green.

 Up next, masking and painting the remaining windows and doors!  Entering the home stretch...

Fancy Facade Revisited

Something was bothering me about the storefront on my model of the Ensminger Building.  After staring at it on the workbench over a few days I realized it was the doors and windows.  I was really happy with how the small-pane inserts looked but not happy at all with the kit supplied doors and the precast two-in-one clear plastic nonsense.  The solution was to utilize parts from another kit then add more small pane muntins.  This not only more closely matches the prototype but unifies the storefront windows visually.

What follows is a sequence of images showing the step-by-step process of how I modified some N scale windows to fit the tall narrow entry windows, the new doors modified, and the assembly as a whole.

3x4 window cut down to 2x3

Side frame trimmed

Side frame reapplied

Original mullion removed, cut down window installed from behind,
 and a new mullion installed using styrene strip

Same process applied to central double door transom

Doors and side panels installed with kit-supplied entry ceiling

 

Photo Studio Walls and First Colors

In the post "Scratch That" I talked about my choice to scratchbuild the wood extension to the Ensminger Building, the actual photo studio or gallery used by the Ensminger Brothers.  Before getting into the modeling progress, here's a brief word on these men whose name I've been bandying about in recent posts.  This page covers their early history and roots in Iowa:

http://www.pioneerphotographers.com/files/Iowa/Ensminger.html 

More relevant to the structure I'm modeling, is this information from the Orange County Regional History Center:

"The Ensminger brothers were two of the most prominent 19th-century photographers in Central Florida. They moved from Iowa to Florida in time to photograph American troops stationed in Tampa in preparation for the Spanish-American War. In 1884 or 1895, Jefferson Clay Ensminger moved to Sanford, where he opened a photography studio with his brother on the west side of North Park Avenue, just a few blocks from the St. Johns River. J.C. Ensminger was known to be friends with Henry Sanford as well as the official photographer of Henry Plant’s Railway System." 

Now back to the model making.

I used V-groove styrene siding to make the walls.  This was a bit fiddly as I hadn't planned for the corner posts in my measurements and had to allow for it or trim off the ends.  That was made more challenging by the odd dimensions of the pitched roof section.  I carefully built up the wall with the large windows before taping the glass itself (cast into the window frame...grr...) in order to prime.  Once the walls were assembled I did just that, giving it all two thin coats of gray.

After the first light coat of primer.

I also managed to paint the brick structure at my local gaming store's paint night.  I usually bring Star Wars Legion minis, but from time to time I raise some eyebrows (in a good way) by bringing something in HO scale.  For the common brick I used a blend of Georgia Clay and a red color, lightening first with tan and then orange for the successive highlight colors.  For the facing brick on the facade I used a Brown Iron Oxide, darkened with a dark chocolate brown for variation.  Here's the result:

The mortar will come later in the process, closer to final assembly.  I spent last night getting the doors sorted.  I've also made great progress on the veranda and side porch which will be featured in an upcoming post.  Thanks for following along.  Happy Modeling!