14 | May | 2021 | Ship Modeler

Getting caught up with the latest post about building a small model of this 19th century Japanese river transport.

The bow cabin, which was called the seiji (say-jee) actually turned out to be one of the easier features of this model to reconstruct. And, honestly, nothing about the Tonegawa Takasebune is difficult to construct, though I did have a little trouble getting the upper part of the bow so that it looked right. But, the cabin is essentially like a wooden tent. Triangular walls front and back, a center beam at the top, and sloping roofs divided into three parts by a pair of beams on either side.

You might notice that I put an interior wall in the bow of the ship, and I added strips to simulate the frame around a sliding door. It’s not a big cabin, maybe close to 9 feet square, so there’s not a lot of living space. Probably enough for a small family to sit or sleep together. But, bedding, utensils and…

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Those of you who might be interested in models of Japanese traditional boats should check out my latest update on this month’s happenings. The biggest items is the Zoom based talk I’ll be giving on modeling traditional Japanese boats on May 27th – just under 2 weeks from now. It’s a free, 1 hour event that’s part of the San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park’s MESS lecture series (Maritime Education for Students of the Sea).

Wasen Mokei 和船模型

After some time off to finish a medieval European cog model and to gain some ground on a couple other ship modeling projects, I started working on wasen models again. It is interesting, though, to have the cog model and a sengokubune model (the Kitamaebune is a class of sengokubune, a common term for this type of coastal transport), sitting close together, as they are both in 1/72 scale.

My models of a medieval european cog (foreground, left) and kitamaebune (background, right), both in 1/72 scale. Different eras and regions, but still interesting to see them side-by-side.