1:35 Piano

A piano in the ruins of a town house

An upright piano stood in the living room of every better European household from the end of the nineteenth century. When the fighting moved into the cities in 1944 and 1945, after a hit it was often the only whole piece of furniture left in a room without a ceiling. Photographers loved it, and so many pictures were taken of a soldier playing in a wrecked room that they became a war motif of their own. That is exactly why this object works on a diorama: it says that somebody lived here.

Box contents

Six cast parts and a photo-etched fret. In sets like this the photo-etched parts are used for the thin elements where a casting would come out disproportionately thick, that is, for the pedal lyre, the hinges of the lid or the candle holders.

How to turn it into furniture

The key is the sheen. The factory surface was a black or dark walnut high gloss in which the window was mirrored, so a smoothly sanded part and a glossy clear varnish do nine tenths of the work. The rest is supplied by contrast: plaster dust on the top, the exposed hammer action under a raised lid and a keyboard where yellowed ivory sits next to a few knocked-out keys.

Tall furniture tests the surroundings as well, because in the 1:35 ratio it reaches roughly to the chest of a standing figure and it shows at once whether the room has the right height.

Around the instrument

A piece of furniture on its own tells nothing. Only scattered sheet music, an overturned stool and a white dusting of crushed plaster turn the room into a place where something has just happened. If a figure is to sit at it, it must sit at the angle at which playing is really possible.