bases up the start of his 1:72 scale WWII Russians.
Today, I'm opening the box on Battlefront's 15mm Cafe, one of the European Buildings line that has been re-released:
With its awnings and gabled mansard-style roof, this café resembles any traditional restaurant, patisserie, coffee house or Konditorei throughout Europe.
Everything comes well wrapped in layers of bubblewrap. (Sorry, forgot to take picture of that!) One piece provides the bottom story:
You've got doors and windows on three sides, painted on the exterior.
On the inside, the floor is painted, but the walls (and doors and windows) are left in gray. There's no indication of where walls or stairs might be.
The box claims the building is tabletop-ready, but actually, the awnings come as separate pieces. They are easily attached (I used superglue), and fit snugly against the raised portions (center them on the windows, of course). I managed to get one of the awnings crooked (can you spot it?), and one of the awnings seems to droop more than the others – nothing too noticeable, I think.
In the next picture, I've added on the next level. Note the interior wall with an (unpainted) interior door. The pieces nest together loosely, with a few millimeters of slip in each direction.
And now I've added the final, large piece – the Mansard-type roof. It fits a bit tighter than the second level, but doesn't quite sit flat.
In the picture below, you can see a bit of wrong color on the roof corner, as well as a faint crack in the top corner of the second floor piece.
The building has no rear-facing windows or doors, which means it can be used on the corners of streets (backing into another building). There's no reason you couldn't flop the pieces 180° to get some rear-facing windows, but then you get blank walls on the front! (And that's not a painting error, it's a reflection from a tile that protrudes more than the others.)
I've added some models for the rest of the pictures, to provide an idea of scale and size.
If you want to put in the extra time, you could paint the interior walls and doors, touch up some of the edges, and possibly add more of a 'glass' effect to the windows. Some signage would also be an improvement.
Also note that there's no way to place units on the third level, unless you scratchbuild a floor for the attic.
However, I think the Cafe will be acceptable as-is for many gamers, and provides a robust structure for your European battlefields.