Modeling Monday pt 2 - Goff Brook Farmhouse, Prep & Painting

Once I received the prototype inspiration for the Goff Brook farmhouse, I decided to get started right away.

As I mentioned before, the City Classics "Railroad Street Company House Kit" is just about perfect. Since it's such a great, generic house (and I haven't built a structure kit in a while, so could use the practice), I decided to get the 3 pack.

It's a really straight-forward kit - the pic above shows all the parts for one house. After familiarizing myself with all the parts, and how I might want to paint them, I used my sanding sticks, files, and an X-Acto to remove any remaining flash. I also cut some of the sprues, not only to be able to get to some of the mold parting lines for removal, but to divide the parts up into  piles for different color paint. Finally, I used a distressing brush to add some additional grain to the stairs, porch and outhouse. I plan for this house to be well-kept, so the walls will remain in good shape.

The next step was to wash the parts. The primary reason to do this is to remove any oils that would hinder paint adhesion. But using an old, stiff toothbrush, soap and warm water, it also removed any fuzz left over from the distressing brush. Once I scrubbed, rinsed and shook, I placed the parts on a couple layers of paper towel to dry overnight.

I originally thought I'd use a bunch of different colors, but settled on two - a flat gray (for the roof sections, porch & porch floor supports, and stairs) and a flat white (for all the walls & porch roof supports). I figured I'd hand paint the chimney with a brush since I'd have to do that with the molded-in stone foundation as well.

Here's where things stand at the moment - drying in my paint booth. Next step will be to do the hand-brushing and mount the windows while it's easy to access the back of the walls (before they're assembled). Speaking of the backs of the walls, I'd considered painting them flat black but, frankly, forgot to and don't want to bother now. I'll be interested to see whether it makes that much of a difference to the finished model.

Of course, I'd appreciate any helpful tips or suggestions from you more-experienced modelers out there. For example, I haven't decided yet whether to weather before assembly or after, though I'm leaning toward "after" - I'm kind of anxious to get this put together and on the layout!