"Michaels Crafts bird house converted to watch tower" Topic

Working on making at least one unique watch tower for my Warhammer games. Saw this randomly at Michaels one day. It's one of the their wood craft bird house projects. Looked like it would be a great starting shape for a medieval or fantasy watch tower. At $5 USD you can't go wrong, you'd spend that much in materials and it saved the trouble of cutting out and assembling pieces.

Here's what the bird house looks like when you buy it;

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And here's what I've done with it so far;

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I envisioned that if I could just cover up the goofy holes for the birds, it would begin to transform the piece. I also decided to give it a more realistic texture, since the bird house castle bricks are just too big and klunky and "crafty".

So I just made two basic balsa wood shapes, a door for the first floor, and a window for the second floor. Then I just measured and cut out fieldstone plasticard and glued that to the outside surfaces. I also made some simple rectangle-shaped arrow slits out of balsa wood. The roof is just four cardboard triangles taped together and glued down in a four-sided pyramid. I'll finish the roof off with some paste board shingles and a few bits from my Warhammer kits.

I'll post more photos when it's full assembled just before painting.

Nicely done. Looking forward to the finished tower.

I wonder if Michaels know about folks like us going through their store looking with this kind of eye.

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most pictures moved, but at least one picture of this same house:
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I don't think I found all the pictures mentioned here:
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andy

I have that one as well (and a couple of others). I am going to use it for my Splintered Lands (anthropomorphic animals) project, so I was ok with the bigger stone blocks, gives it kind of a kids book feel.

I have converted a couple of Michael's birdhouses for use with my 40mm AWI and Medival.

They give a great foundadtion to build from.

I've been eyeing those for chibi battles!

Great conversion.

I came close to picking up one when reduced, but the lack of space on the battlements dissuaded me.

You are definitely making me rethink that.

Definitely got the space ship for Jules Verne style adventuring, but it's still just unpainted wood in the basement.

Doug