Located in East Anglia is St Ives, home to the model show hosted by Brampton Model Club. The largest single day show in the area I was extremely curious to how the show.

It took me about 3 hours to get there and I arrived at 11:30. Doors opened at 10, but luckily the venue – a leisure centre/conference centre with adjoining school – has ample parking. This is something critical as some shows have less than desirable parking which can make the show really inaccessible for those going longer distances.

The layout of the show is essentially 2 zones. A smaller room with an initial few clubs, followed by a larger room with the bar, majority of clubs and mezzanine with the the remainder of clubs and some of the large displays.

Accessibility appeared to be good. Though spacing wasn’t as large as say Stoke-on-Trent or Thornbury. I often found myself being asked to move because having a backpack alone was enough to obstruct some pathways – so be aware you will get up close with people.

With that caveat the show is absolutely worth the visit. I made the trip purely for the show and left feeling very satisfied.

The amount of vendors around was great and thankfully most took card payments too. Modelsforsale, a larger vendor, was there too which is always a welcome distributor for reasonably priced rarities and oddities!

The majority of the show was of course the displays themselves and the variety on offer was impressive. Upstairs was quieter (as is often the case at shows outside of the ‘main area’) but there was no lack of character or colour!

It was especially lovely to see less traditional ‘model’ clubs there – such as the Card Model group! I always think it’s so important to encourage other crafts into the modelling space to help keep the community fresh and modern. It’s even convinced me that card modelling might be quite a fun project!

Overall this is a great show, one that I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on for next year in the colander!

Below is just a small sample of photos from the show – the video at the top of the article has what I think is every display!