1892 Scottish Town | Big & Blocky Challenge
Honourable Mention in the Big & Blocky Challenge 2022. A historically researched blockout of a Scottish town in the 1890s, built from archive photographs, maps and building plans.
Research
For my submission I recreated a Scottish town as it stood in the 1890s. It's a place I'd wanted to build for a long time, and I spent a lot of time with historical photographs and maps to get the layout and buildings as accurate as possible.
Hero Building & Blockout
I started with the 18th-century Town House, a detailed hero building that I modelled quickly and accurately from blueprints. From there I blocked out the rest of the town, paying attention to detail without getting stuck on it, as there was still a lot of ground to cover.
Lost Buildings
One of the most interesting parts was rebuilding structures that have since been demolished or heavily altered, using old photographs as the only reference. Bringing them back added a lot of historical accuracy to the scene.
Set Dressing & Lighting
To populate the town I built street lamps, trees, water pumps and other props, then experimented with lighting and atmosphere before settling on a foggy evening with a teal sky and warm orange lights.
Filling the Gaps
Some buildings, like the Central Bar, had very little surviving reference, so I filled the gaps using what I knew of the period and the surrounding architecture.
Result
The finished blockout shows how I research and rebuild historical architecture, combining point cloud data and archive photography for accuracy. I'm proud it earned an Honourable Mention in the challenge.