Photos by the author

Baran�w Sandomierski is my first GPM kit. Anyone interested in paper modelling surely knows that GPM is one of the best and most prolific stables around. They concentrate mainly on land vehicles but also aircraft and boat subjects. Buildings appear only on their �mini ABC� series and, judging from the number of parts, they are simpler than GPM�s average.

The model is rather large: 45cm wide, 26cm long and 17cm high. The kit comes in booklet form, with 338 parts very finely printed on very good paper. Many of the parts are to be glued onto 0,5mm or 1,0mm card. Most of those are printed on thin paper, on no less than 4 A4+ pages. All the parts to be reinforced are clearly marked with * (0,5mm) or ** (1,0mm). You can see some of them in picture 1.

Picture 1 � Work in progress. Card reinforcement of parts

Construction methods are very different from Erkotyp and Schreiber-Bogen: there are very few tabs to glue and many of them are separate parts. This is not bad, because they get completely hidden. The method of building cylinders for the towers is also peculiar. A GPM cylinder has four parts: a rectangular one for the side, a separate tab part, to be glued on the interior, and two round parts that must be glued onto card, not just to give strength but also to have 1mm to put glue! There are a lot of those in picture 2.

Picture 2 � Cylinders

The resulting cylinder looks good, with very sharp edges. The only drawback is that cutting card requires a lot more effort than paper, and when I have to cut dozens of card parts my fingers threaten to go on strike. Well, that�s how life is: you are never completely happy. The result is that the kit is hard work to build but not too difficult. GPM rates difficulty at 2, in a scale of 1 to 3, and I find this fair.

The parts are numbered according to the construction sequence. This is always a good thing. Also very good are the construction diagrams, in two pages, along with colour pictures of the completed model, in another page. There are some written instructions and a brief history of the site, but only in Polish.

Printing is excellent, with very fine detail, going as far as the individual brick, and realistic-looking colours. However, looking at the windows, you find out that GPM has not only discovered computer graphics but also the joy of copy and paste. Every window in the lower floor looks exactly the same, with the curtains in exactly the same position! Mr GPM, a bit more variety, please!

The building has a simple shape, roughly rectangular, with an inner yard of almost the same shape and a tower at each corner � see pictures 3 and 4.

Picture 3 � Inner yard, under construction

Picture 4 � Completed model � top view

Some of the detail is not there only to see but also to cut. That is the case in the top of some walls and also in the inner yard � see pictures 5 and 6.

Picture 5 � Detail of the top of some walls

Picture 6 � Inner yard detail

Pictures 7 to 10 are general views of the completed model. Picture 11 is a detail of one of the towers, with its pretty cupolas. The top one is only 1cm high.

Picture 7 � Front view

Picture 8 � Rear view

Picture 9 � Lateral view � right and back walls

Picture 10 � Lateral view � left and front walls

Picture 11 � Tower detail

This is not my favourite building but it has, hopefully, introduced me to Polish paper building methods, which I find more appropriate for vehicles. I have just acquired one of them � K5(E) Leopold* � and it looks awesome, to say the least! Maybe I'll have the courage to start with that one next summer.

* Editor's note: this is one of the huge German railway guns of WWII.

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