Re-Clutter your Life (#Terraintober Immersion marker Project) Part 16 – Outhouse

On By The OneIn 15mm, Terrain

This Part 16 of a series of a fair few posts, Part 1 (link here) gives an overview and the philosophy applied to the series – cheap, simple and fun.

When I was young boy we went to see some relatives in Finland in their country house. The little house did not have a “normal” toilet but instead they had an outhouse for the job. I was so scared of going in there that I almost shat myself outside – a little bit of a paradox. Anyway I went in to do the deed, when I sat there in my solitude I saw a bucket with some white powder and a big ladle. I found it strange to have a bucket of flour on the loo and ask my Mum why. She explain is was to keep the flies away from the “shit”. Well in reality the “flour” was lime powder and it kills the bacteria (minimising the smell) at the cost of the speed of the decomposing process.

Another thing was the bloody flies in the area and I was not used to this and there were a lot of normal flies and horseflies. One day as I came back from the toilet visit my Mum looked chocked and said “What have you done, you are white all over your body and hair”. I smiled, and according to mum, looked very prooud of myself, “Mum, I had enough of these flies, so I poured the bucket of lime over me.”.

Today we are making an outhouse (you buy a nice one from Peter Pig, I have a few already). Anyway let us get going.

Measure up the front of the outhouse based on the models you have, this is in 15mm
Then make four sides using coffee stirrer cut lengthwise, mine will be a little bit wider than deep, I basically cut out four shapes from vinyl floor tiles (or thick cardboard) then clad the pieces. This design is based on a taller front than base with a backwards sloping roof.
Then I cut the sides in an angle so it is easier to fit the pieces together.
Glue the pieces together on a base

Add some planks to simulate a door

Add a roof, I used some vinyl tiles. Then added some thin sand to represent roof felt (using PVA).
A door handle
And some hinges, you could use some thin plastic tubes or perhaps spaghetti?
Then Paint it, notice the structure on top of the roof.

And that budget, well we are still at £17.93 we are now beyond half-way on this project and will we make it under £30.

Tomorrow we are doing a Swedish Hayrack.

/ Hope that was of some interest

11 thoughts on “Re-Clutter your Life (#Terraintober Immersion marker Project) Part 16 – Outhouse”

  3. Phil Carrington

    That’s brilliant ! All it needs is a ‘busy – go away’ sign hanging off the handle…

    Really enjoying the ‘clutter your life’ series.

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  4. Anonymous

    It must be a Swedish thing, or probably more likely a rural life thing. My Swedish grandfather and his family built a number of cabins in the mountains nearby. I’ve inherited one of them, and it has an “outhouse” inside the garage. As a kid, I remember the can of lime next to the seat, but I only had to use it when we hadn’t turned cabin’s the water on yet . Luckily we boarded up the seat long ago.

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  5. More good stuff. Outhouses were not uncommon in my youth and my family (the Finnish side) had one at the family sauna camp. No lime (and I hope you did not douse yourself with quicklime!). I think I saw some at YMCA camp and also when I was in the Army at training areas. The one thing they all had in common was the “crescent moon” on the door (which at 15mm would have been a challenge but you could do it). Maybe not in Europe?

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  6. Pingback: Re-Clutter your Life (#Terraintober Immersion marker Project) Part 1 – The Pig Sty – Roll a One – Wargaming Blog

  7. Pingback: Re-Clutter your Life (#Terraintober Immersion marker Project) Part 31 – Summary of it all. – Roll a One – Wargaming Blog

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