Euro Militaire – slight return

I returned to Folkestone for what must now be the fourth time in ten years. This time I remembered the way from the station until I got into the town centre but then turned off too early and ended up down at the harbour. To get back up to the promenade, where the Pavilion is, involved a long exhausting walk up a hill.

That’s the second time I’ve done that  (the first time was on my first visit) and I thought I’d cracked it by now. Maybe next year – if I go again – I’ll get it right. There was only a small queue of people waiting for tickets when I got there, about twenty minutes after it opened, and generally the show seemed much quieter this year.

Stuff I bought

It also felt smaller than I remembered it. I did a couple of quick circuits of the stalls before checking out the contest. Not a lot new on sale that appealed to me though there were some show specials. I spotted the Origen stall with their new Boudicca bust but they’d only brought about four of them. I was tempted but passed.

(The point to getting there reasonably early is that dealers never bring enough copies of their new stuff for some reason – so it always pays to ask how many they have. I had a bit of trouble making the Origen people understand my question in English but it was clear they had no concept of the demand there would be for a nicely sculpted bust. Ten minutes later they’d sold out.)

I moved on to the MDC stall where I made most of my purchases last year and snapped up two new kits (they only had two copies) of a steampunk biker and horsemen.

These were largeish – I’d guess 120mm – and had some style and impact. I heard quite a lot of orders being taken for them once they’d gone. Unfortunately there don’t seem to be good pictures available of either but they were definitely the only kits of real interest to me at the show.

(see the workbench article on Blaylock here)

Blaylock – picture doesn’t do it justice

This year, more than ever, I was struck by how small everything seemed.  54mm and even 70mm are scales I now think I’ll be avoiding in future. They just don’t have enough impact.

Stuff I saw

There were no really outstanding pieces that caught my eye in the contest this year but there were one or two quite nice scratch built and adapted dioramas (see below).

My feelings about the painting styles (see previous post) haven’t really changed much.

Photo by Pekka Tapani Nieminen

Euro Militaire 2017

After a couple of years when I was too busy to make the trip I finally returned again this year. The show is now ‘under new management’ and has technically been rechristened as ‘Euro Miniatures Expo’ but is still being held in the Leas Pavilion in Folkestone.

Little had changed since my last visit. It still hasn’t quite recaptured its glory days and was a relatively quiet affair. I got there early and found myself waiting with a lot of older mil-mod enthusiasts who seemed to be mainly English although many of the exhibitors were from Europe – Italy, Greece and Spain particularly. One wonders what will happen after Brexit.

I only stayed a couple of hours. The merchandise area was fairly empty of customers when I arrived but had filled up a bit by the time I left. There were no ‘show specials’ that appealed to me and few surprises to tempt me. I saw one or two quite nicely sculpted non-military pieces but decided they were not special enough to overlook their small size. (I think I was very influenced this time by the large scale kits I’ve bought recently which, from a price proportion point of view, are much better value.)

I did buy a couple of quite nice bases from a Greek company called Terra Models, an Arab door and a Steampunk one (see below) which I think I’ll be able to use and I collected a bust I had on order from Mr Lee’s Minis which will save me postage and hassle. I also bought a few resin pedestals and some bottles of Alclad paint. I’d hope to find some good oil paints, ideally the Abteilung range, but I was out of luck.

Unfortunately I was too early to really get the benefit of the competition models because most people were still registering and setting up, but there were a couple of quite nicely done fantasy vignettes already on display. One year I’d like to try submitting one my humble efforts but I’d have to be prepared to go down two days in a row which would be difficult to arrange.