Lionel Playford - Titanics 1 and 2 - Card, Bostik and Other Materials
As an obsessed teenager in the mid 1970's I made two different models of the Titanic. Both were built from scratch out of card and Bostik glue based on minute research of photos and plans I found. (The skills I learned from this turned out to be quite useful as a professional shipbuilder in the 1980's). The small, recently damaged, model (top) is extremely detailed - I need glasses now to see it and I no longer have the dexterity to make anything so fine (though it's pleasingly rough, too). The large one is more accurate but a bit twisted and lumpy in places - certainly falling short of the aesthetic standards I set when making it and therefore an unforgivable failure.
I showed the larger model to a primary school class yesterday and now the head teacher is keen to get the children apprenticed to create an even bigger failure (about 8m long), using corrugated card and anything else she can get for free. I think the children were less than impressed despite the great amount of effort I put into drawing and making it all those years ago. In fact, some of them were much more interested in the superficially 'perfect' painted plastic model I brought in.
Many people in Belfast felt until quite recently that the Titanic was a huge failure on the part of the workers.
Lionel Playford's Website
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