How to: a Scenic Model Railroad

Build model mountains and tunnels on a base of extruded insulation foam cut to fit your model railroad base. Use a paring knife to cut the foam into layers that will stack into mountains and wad up newspaper into irregular shapes and tape to them for texture.

Coat the sides of the mountains with plaster cloth dipped in water, pressing it into the recesses and smoothing over with your fingers as necessary and allow to dry.

Base coat the scenery with acrylic paints in earth tones appropriate to the landscape. Mountains will be light brown or shades of gray, forest floors will be brown, and open fields will be yellow or green.

Apply a second coat in small sections and use a sieve to sprinkle model landscaping materials like ground foam over the wet paint.

Dilute a few ounces of black, brown or dark gray ink with water in a ratio of at least one part ink to four parts water. Use a broad paint brush to apply the solution to painted rocky mountain landscapes to create shadows and shading.

Add commercially produced model trees with white glue or make your own by twisting and bending wire into trunks and branches. Wrap floral tape around the trunk and paint brown or gray. Coat the limbs with contact adhesive and apply model foliage or foam to create trees.

Add rustic or old-fashioned buildings and features along the railway like log cabins, station houses, water towers and coal tipples.

Reserve an area for the commercial center of the railroad and add a ticket station, gift shop, parking area and passenger station.