Since I took over North Hallelujah and changed its theme to the 1950s Southern California town (and renamed it Hemet in the process), I’ve always had a big sky blue backdrop behind the town.

I started with a bit of research, going to Jim Lancaster’s site, coastdaylight.com to go through the various pictures he and others have compiled of some of the remaining packing houses in the southland. From this, I found a few packing houses with which to work off of – aspects of packing houses in Piru, Redlands, Olive Park, and Corona could be cobbled together to make a large, 4 door packing house, with some added visual detail.

Most of these were Sunkist packing houses, so we’ll need to add in that signage detail too.

Using the ideas from above, I wanted space for 4 doors. As this will be a transitional structure, I knew that one blank space and one door would give me about 40 scale feet. To make way for the height of the addition (which would have been storage or refrigeration on the prototype), I used both a double wall and an additional single wall to give a bit of height perspective.

For added strength, I then cut foam board to glue to the back. The structure still won’t stand upright due to a slight warp (and the backdrop isn’t straight), so I need to reinforce the base a little more. Before that though, I brought it down to the club for a test fitting.

I’ve got some gaps to fill and paint, but so far so good. Proper doors, signage and details (downspouts, a little weathering, some paint patches, and maybe some ivy growing in a spot or two) will help really give this some character. More to come!