Rod Stewart’s Lets The World See His Completed Model Railway

Published Nov 14, 2019 By Gayle Asunto

via Daily Mail UK

26 Years in the Making

When he’s not busy with his music, Rod Stewart has other passions including building a massive 124ft long x 23ft wide model railway which took him over two decades to complete. It’s incredibly detailed and he drew inspiration from the view in his childhood home at 507 Archway Road in North London which is now demolished. But when he started to work on it in 1993, he was inspired by American railways because at the time, he was living in Los Angeles. He built an attic room specifically for the purpose of the layout.

The model railway depicts a 1940s American city containing hundreds of buildings. Appropriately called Grand Street And Three Rivers City, aside from the railway station, there are factories, coal wagons, warehouses, skyscrapers, bridges, period cars, and lorries.

All of that view is made more dramatic by the lighting which mimics the golden glow of late afternoons.

Stewart told Railway Modeller magazine, “It’s the landscape I like. Attention to detail, extreme detail, is paramount. There shouldn’t be any unsightly gaps or pavements that are too clean.”

Comparing American railways to the British ones however, Stewart said: “They’re [American] bigger, the locos are bigger but not any better.”

Stewart also worked on it while he was on tour – even booked an extra hotel room for the layout. He added that this helped him de-stress, “When I take on something creative like this, I have to give it a 110 per cent. For me, it’s addictive. I started, so I just had to finish.”

Check out the photos below.