Retro Caravan: Experimenting With the Exterior

Photo from Life and Leisure magazine

I saw this photo in a Life and Leisure magazine, liked the colour scheme and decided I'd make my caravan look like that. First thing was to spraypaint the inside and outside in white. Then I dithered over whether to paint the bottom part of the exterior red or try something else.

   I was wandering round Mitre 10 and saw a roll of red contact paper, the type, with a paper backing that peels off, that you stick on kitchen shelves. That was an 'aha' moment!

Starting the exterior of the miniature caravan

   At miniatures club on Sunday, I cut the contact paper to size and stuck it on, taking care to get the air bubbles out. It looked OK, but after a while, the paper started to lift up. So I peeled it all off, put a layer of tacky glue over the wood and repositioned the paper. It slipped around a bit then - I'd get one side lined up but by the time I'd smoothed it on, it would have slid out of position.

   However, I persevered and let it dry. I found some metal strips that I thought I'd do the edges with but they were too hard to bend and stick down on the curved parts. So I'm going to try this white braid up the sides and around the wheel arch.

   I'm still in experimental mode on this. By the time I go to minis club next month I might have ripped it all off and started again!