|
Building paper kits has been a popular
hobby in Europe for generations and one of the leading manufacturers
is the J.F. Schreiber Company of Esslingen, Germany, a firm established in 1831. The
company offers a wide variety of kits in
different scales and levels of difficulty, ranging from zeppelins
and medieval castles to ocean liners and high-speed trains. The
completed 1:100 scale model of the famous Dornier Do-X flying boat
shown here is 48 cm (19-in.) wide by 48 cm (19-in.) long and costs about 13
Euros ($18.75 US).
Paper modeling is an inexpensive,
relaxing pasttime that requires very little in terms of tools and
equipment; basically an X-acto knife (or scissors), a cutting mat, a straight-edge
and a bottle of glue. The kits consist of large printed sheets of
heavy card stock ("Bogen"
is German for "sheet of paper"), folded into a booklet format. Detailed instructions are printed on the
reverse sides of the pages. Like virtually everything made in
Germany, the quality is second-to-none.
Hopefully these kits will become more
popular in North America as modelers look for "green"
alternatives to petroleum-based plastics and solvent-laden adhesives
and paints. Admittedly, paper models are not as detailed as their
plastic counterparts, but they still allow one to gain a firm sense of
the subject's proportions and appearance, which is really what it's all
about. And ultimately, if they do end up in a landfill site, they are
completely biodegradable.
|
|
|
|
|
1930 Schreiber
ad |
2011 Concorde kit |
Junkers Ju 52 |
 |
|
1930
testimonial praising Schreiber
paper kits |
|
