Moria's Mitgardian Embassy - New Pictures

[Rolli]

Some of you might remember me winning Challenge 2 for Avalonia with my embassy. And some might even remember me promising to take adequate pictures of it. It took me quite a while - almost a year and a half - but I can finally present you my embassy in all its glory in decent pictures. You'll also find some behind the scenes pictures in here, as many of you asked me how I built for example the roof (all pictures link to flickr with higher resolution). The old thread can be found here.

Some pictures of the details:

1. The front of the upper story.

2. The entrance and the ground floor.

3. The side of the roof and its bay.

4. A second view of the roof.

The construction of the roof is fairly simple. The look with the cheese slopes is achieved by placing 2x4 plates (or any plate that is 2 wide) on another 2x4 plate with an offset of 1 stud. Then you use an abundance of 1x1 cheese slopes to cover these. After the whole surface is covered, we use this thing upside down and it will look like this:

In order to achieve this angle I used quite an unusual technique: The roof itself just sits in there and is not connected to the house itself. It got me a very nice angle by using the 1x2x3 inverted slopes as a 'frame':

A view from the back (yes, I only built half of it, you got me ):

To make things not too easy, I also included the bay with the window in the roof. In this case, I achieved the angle by using hinges to which I connected the cheese slope surface. I left a hole in the big roof so that I could place the bay in it. Fairly easy I guess.

I'm actually going to tear it down finally but I'm planning to build a 'version 2.0' for my city layout. There are some parts that I want to improve so lets see where I will end with that. If you have any suggestions, feel free!

I hope I was able to give you some insight in how to create a cheese slope. The explanation is fairly simple so if you have any questions regarding this, feel free to contact me. Currently I'm working on a roof for a round tower built from cheese slopes and it is looking good - stay tuned!

Finally: Yes, this building is almost one and a half years old but I would still like to get comments and more importantly critique. If you have anything to add, do not hesitate to do so!

Regards!

[soccerkid6]

These pictures really show off the tremendous build this is! I'm very glad you did get around to taking more

The building is jaw dropping the stonework, woodwork and roof design all come together beautifully The forestman's hats used as decoration are a neat detail.

My only criticisms are toward the landscape: the snow looks a bit block in some places (especially next to the lady), some bushes or even grass stalks here and there would make the snow more interesting (example), and I'm guessing the dark tan/tan plates are a path, if so I think they should go all the way to the stairs,

[Wedge09]

Awesome work I love the style, the color schem, all of this MOC

[Legofin2012]

Amazing! How many cheese slopes did it take for that roof?

[ZCerberus]

Very nice.

The part I always liked best was the sloped staircase. Thanks for the insight on your techniques,they could be very useful one day. Also great use of all the reddish brown as carved wood details, they are great.

Part of me liked the old pictures better. For whatever reasons the colors of those pictures were more eye pleasing and the angle hid some of the small spacing issues like the ones between the stair treads.

Still lovely and an awesome build.

[de Gothia]

Wow Rolli! Those cheese slopses are beautiful as a roof in that colour!

Many nice details to love here! My favourite part is the second floor with the barrels and dk/reddish brwon combined!

[Gideon]

Fantastic build! I'm glad you reposited it since I wasn't around when it was originally posted and still haven't taken the time to go through all the old builds...

I probably like the carved wood details best, but the stone foundation and roof are top notch as well :)

[TheLegoDr]

Where to begin? Of course, the cheese slopes look great as roofing. I may have to borrow that idea (with credit). The ruling on the walls looks great. The angled stairwell looks fantastic. The dark brown and red brown look great together. The barrels are a nice architectural detail that I wouldn't have thought to use.

My most favorite part is actually that you only built half of the building. That inspires me to do the same. I like that concept. make the visible part count and use less pieces overall.

[Balthasar]

Awesome build man and thanks for showing the inside! Something you don't see that often, but which I often wonder about.

[MikroMan]

Fantastic roof technique and the stairs are great Also, the reddish brown detailing works nice.

[Maxim I]

Coool to see how you made that build!!!

It was really breathtaking for me back then (as I was a beginner), but it still has the same effect now!!

Also very funny to see you only made half of the house

[ZCerberus]

Also very funny to see you only made half of the house

One of the greats, our own Sirens of Titan only ever builds 2 sides as well. It certainly conserves bricks, but makes them hard to bring to a show.

[Maxim I]

One of the greats, our own Sirens of Titan only ever builds 2 sides as well. It certainly conserves bricks, but makes them hard to bring to a show.

I just didn't expected it from seeing this result I mostly do 3 walls. But if I build for placing the MOC in a big lay-out in an exposition, I try to have all 4 walls

Anyway, I will make more 2 wall buildings in the future as I have no other option I fear (most of my bricks are in my Mpya Stedor city)

[TheLegoDr]

I always tried building all four walls, but sometimes the ending result wasn't as desired. So maybe conserving bricks in one place to use them elsewhere will help the end result. But of course, you are right that it would be hard to incorporate into a larger layout or a convention.

[Rolli]

My only criticisms are toward the landscape: the snow looks a bit block in some places (especially next to the lady), some bushes or even grass stalks here and there would make the snow more interesting (example), and I'm guessing the dark tan/tan plates are a path, if so I think they should go all the way to the stairs,

Yep, totally right. Not a big fan of my landscaping there but the bricks you see there is pretty much all the white stuff I have (or had - I don't know if my collection of white grew since then). When I posted it a year ago I had some bushes in the landscape but I had to take them away for something else and obviously forgot to put them in again..

Amazing! How many cheese slopes did it take for that roof?

The big roof has about 550 cheese slopes and the smaller ones probably add up to another 400 or so, didn't count them. I just remember having to order numerous times from bricklink for just the white ones as I kept running out all the time.

I may have to borrow that idea (with credit).

Oh, please, go ahead! No credit necessary, I'm not the first one pulling this off. If you have any questions though, feel free to contact me!

I just didn't expected it from seeing this result

Haha! Thanks. I actually would have had enough bricks to finish the other sides and I was even planning to do so but it wasn't possible to finish it in time for the hand-in-date back then. When I took it back out two weeks ago I said to myself that I will take photos of the thing I handed in last February, not a improved version or something like that. This is something for the future as I mentioned above.

It certainly conserves bricks, but makes them hard to bring to a show.

Indeed. Its only purpose was to be photographed so I didn't care too much. My next builds are all going to be a part of an exhibition in the summer so no 2-wall-buildings anymore. Lets see how fast I run out of bricks

Edited June 16, 2013 by Rolli

[Ecclesiastes]

Thanks for the new photo's Rolli. Especially for the ones showing some of the technics used. I just noticed the use of the forrest men hats under the gables, nice touch!