I guess I'm about 70% finished with this build, so far it's sitting at a personal "best" cost of 821, 000. o.0

Anywho, I wanted to post in here and get some ideas on walls, I just have no idea how to handle them. At the moment they seem chunky and weird and ugh. I don't know.

Front:


Here the basic idea would just be to replicate the left on the right. But I'm not even sure I like it.

Back:


Here I have absolutely no idea. It's a blank canvas essentially.


(The building itself is still missing windows and proper textures. Oh, and furniture, lol. )

wow :o !! it looks beautiful

have you done anything in the interior??

I've been to Hampton Court, but I can't find those pictures, perhaps on my blog? It's not built for defense, but one feature they usually make a lot out of is the gatehouse:


Hampton Court Palace by Thais e Mattia Magosso, on Flickr

Hampton walls:
Hampton Court by See-MG, on Flickr

http://www.shafe.co.uk/art/tudor_03...dor_palaces.asp

It just looks to me like you have too much deco on your defence walls. You can just google for tudor gatehouse, walls or something and pics to get pictures for inspiration.

What about just having some foundation with those bug bulky fences or perhaps green fences on top?

^ oh! That looks great! Maybe if I make some sort of gatehouse like Hampton's for the front but then rid myself of the side and rear walls. I was trying to be "realistic" but I mean, that picture you posted of Hampton just looks like it has a retaining wall. That would be really hard to pull off now that I've already done the rear garden. But I could open that up and do something with fences instead of that 1 storey high "foundation" wall I have currently.



Yes, quite a bit. The only rooms still barren are the entrance and staircase halls. Also hallways here and there. I also still need to paint ceilings and go around hunting for ceiling glitches. Of which there are many above landscaping.

yes, I would just put some effort into the gatehouse. Having a grand gatehouse was an important statement according to some experts on the tele. The rest can just be a regular fence or something.

oh cant wait to see pics from the interior ! good luck with the ceilings !

What you've created there is magnificent, I can only imagine the amount of effort you have put into it so far, and the amount of effort it will take to finish. The walls look impressive on the front, and I suggest replicating the design on the finished side onto the unfinished side. But round the back, the walls just don't have the same effect.
Maybe you could try and see how the place would look without the wall out the back and vary the wall covering on the house itself like you have done on the wall out fron.

Here's my reasoning for this suggestion:
To the Tudors, the fact that a house was made out of red brick rather than the traditional and old fashioned stone was a statement of wealth in itself. Henry 8th was arguably the first peace-time monarch, so the palaces that he designed and had built reflected this with their distinctive lack of defenses and increased focus on ornamentation. Hampton Court isn't the best example as the only Tudor section of it that remains is the gatehouse/entrace in Volvenom's first picture. The second picture is of a much later part built in the Georgian times when most of the Tudor palace was demolished and replaced. The section in the first picture was one of the few sections to survive.
Hatfield Old Palace is a good example where the bricks themselves were the statement rather than additional ornamentation:

Kentwell Hall is a good example that shows a moat was more of a thing for showing off rather than a defense mechanism:

Another good example is the Christchurch Mansion, which is void of any defenses:

Layer Marney Tower is an example that your wonderful creation bares a resemblance to as well:



Here's some other examples that you could get inspiration from for the brickwork:
http://www.oldhousedreams.com/2012/...ngland-3800564/
http://www.oldhousedreams.com/2012/...rshire-england/
http://www.oldhousedreams.com/2012/...orfolk-england/
http://www.shafe.co.uk/art/tudor_03...dor_palaces.asp
I hope these will help you perfect your already wonderful design

WOW! Fergie, that is such a great post! Thanks so much for the compliments and all the work you put into finding those pictures. They're all so beautiful, with Hatfield Old Palace being a personal favourite. That really is stunning.

I will get to work now on new walls and share pictures. Hopefully we can come up with something!

Okay, holy crap, it took way longer than I thought it would to come up with something. :vlol:



I will (after a break for tea and biscuits, lol) remake the wall on either side. What do you guys think of this for the gatehouse? Is it okay that I've butchered wall textures with the cast tool so? Also, do you think I should add more depth to it, so it has 4 towers?

The banquetting hall of Hatfield Old Palace is stunning lol. It looks so crude.


The Banquetting Hall by Stuart-Lee, on Flickr

For scoopy. I like that arch you had on your first gate. The cfe one. This new one looks a bit understated, I was also wondering about a couple of smaller towers on the outside of the ones you have now.

Something like this?


Hmm. I don't know... the one with the arch object just seemed, neater?

I think I prefer the CFE archway you've just done to the regular archway. Although I'm not entirely sure. Maybe you could try a fancier archway, or even a doorway?

Higher up you had an archway with those wooden cross sections. We don't have that here, so I don't know what it's called. I found what I thought about in the Holborn district in city of London.


The Staple Inn - London by Mythic Ink, on Flickr

Your probably perfectly confused now, but you had a gate higher up with this kind of walls around the gate, may just be perfectly useless lol.

Okay, so, how's this?

Front (OMG! Derpy banners are DERPY! How did I miss that! )


Side (slightly older pic than the one above)


Back


House for servants or groundsmen or somesuch


House is still missing proper wall paint, ceilings, some furniture. Landscaping is missing some more rock faces and some trees. But what do you think of the walls? (And now, lack thereof)

Stunning work, I keep starring at the same picture, just trying to figure out how the roofs among others were done. Fabulous work and thanks everyone for th inspirational screenshots in here. So many things to get influenced from, so many shiney ideas, it already gets frustrating xD

Now that is an entrance worthy of even King Henry himself. It looks a lot better without the wall around the back. If you keep up that level of quality, you could have a featured creation on your hands.
Given how fancy the main house is, I'd suggest making the servant's house a bit fancier to match it. You could make it timber with plaster rather than all weathered timber.

This is much bigger than I initially though. :o

This is an amazing job. WOW!!

Thanks for the warm and fuzzies everybody! :D



I would keel over and die.



What do you think of this timber/plaster combo, still too rustic?

Yes it's absolutely massive lolz.

The gatehouse is now just the right size for the house and you can have more garden. I must say though for future planning, I would have made the house a bit smaller so the garden could be bigger. Unless you have some equally fab interior plans lol.

I think the staff house is ok as it was. Usually they would use the money they have for maintaining the main house partly, and then the staff house would be the last thing they think about. If that's the plan you have though, you may wanna give the house and gatehouse a more rundown look in parts of the fazade.

On the garden I must say that green fence is not my favourite, it looks fake. I only use it to save the file size and then try to live it up a bit with some more lifelike plants here and there. The ground terrain you're using is also not my fav, it looks like asphalt.

Edit: the point with the green fence is mostly on the last pic with the statues in the slope infront of the staff house.

One of the challenges I set myself with this lot was making it huge. Why would I want to do a big garden? It's a castle! :p



Yeah, the money being spent only on the primary residence was what spurred me to make the gatekeeper's house more rustic. The servants quarters inside the castle are also much more rustic than the rooms for guests / family.



I like the hedge fence. :'c But I will play around with that area a bit more, since now that you've said something, something about it bugs me.

As for the terrain paint, it's EA's "gravel" and I like it, so :p

Personally, I think that the servant's house is still a bit too rustic. It would reflect badly on the owner if the servant's house wasn't as well kept (on the exterior atleast) as the main house. If the servant's house was on a seperate lot and not nearly as close to the main house then I think its current rustic state would be acceptable. But given how close it is to the main house I would advise making it atleast look cleaner on the outside, like this house in Dorset:

If you're looking for a bit more inspiration, there's a town near me called Lavenham that played Godrick's Hollow in Harry Potter. It is very good to look at if you want to make the exterior of the servant's house a bit more colourful. You could also try a timber and brick combination; as seen on the house in Lavenham on this page: http://www.oldhousedreams.com/2012/...tional-edition/
And these houses:


I hope these will help

Just turn the hole lot around and problem is solved

Being a scandinavian, I must say I like the clay and wood combination better than those bricks. Only my opinion though, coming from the land of stone and wood.

Your building skills are impressive, and it's remarkable that the house is symmetric, but not 100% symmetric, which makes it more realistic. To be honest I love everything of it except for the color palette. Not only the main building, but also the servants' house are way too dark and saturated in my opinion. Look at the backyard pic, for example: the walls that are in the shadow (and also in the moonlight, I assume) are extremely dark. You should tone it down a bit, the whole compound should have pale terracotta and grey tones, not such heavy browns (it's an ancient castle after all )

Anyway, kudos for the amazing architecture.