"European Houses in WW2" Topic

From old WW2 pictures and war game boards setup, I could see a lot of houses with sloped roof. Are European houses with flat rooftop common in a city setting? Was trying to build some game boards and is now researching background info before building them!

Thanks for feedback!

I think pitched roofs were the norm until the 1980s when flat roofs became more common. This is for single houses and streets of single houses. Larger buildings I think it's more varied. It really depends on where and what kind of house we are dealing with.

European roofs tend to get steeper the further north you go. It's all about the weather!

I don't think you would find many flat roofs in WW2.

What part of Europe are we talking about?

In the UK pitched (sloped) roofs were the norm for houses up to the 1960s (when flat roofed system built houses were common for public sector housing), although small numbers of "art deco" flat roofed houses were built between the wars. Flat roofed houses remain very much in the minority.

For wargames terrain I'd go with pitched roofs unless you have a source that shows otherwise. As Cedric says styles change throughout Europe, so if you want a particular area you will need to do some further delving.

As above, I'd go with sloped roofs. Postwar pre-fabs had flat roofs, but they were built to replace bombed out houses (with sloped roofs).

Residential houses all had pitched roofs. Flat roofs were rare and usually confined to new government or industrial buildings in major industrial cities.

Sloped roofs…lived in Europe for 13 years. About the only time I saw flat roofs were on public housing apartment blocks or industrial facilities in the more modern period.

A lot of roofs were simply made, just joists of various sorts run from side wall to side wall with the roof covering just laid over them, the drainage was provided by having the walls given an inverted 'V' shape – often encountered in 'terrace' houses (like 4Ground's Normandy houses).

Mansard roofs (introduced in the 1800's)were also popular for commercial building intended to impress such as department stores and hotels – Mansard roofs have a very low slope on the main roof with sides sloped around 10-20 degrees off vertical, usually with windows sticking out like dormer windows. They gave a fair bit of useful space for storage and offices.

Also popular for factories of varying sizes were the saw tooth profile roofs with windows in vertical panels – everything was connected to lattice beams running from side wall to sidewall with box gutters in the valleys and one wall built a few inches higher than the other to empty the gutters.

Thank you everyone, your input are invaluable. Will spend more time looking into the general design and such. Appreciated!

It's all about snow. The more likely the weather will bring deep snow which will stay (not melt) then the steeper the pitch of the roof.