Selecting the appropriate bench work footprint for your model railroad design is one of the most important design decisions you’ll ever...

One of the most common questions I get from clients is a request for tips on the best way to prepare a room for a future layout. Lighting...

When starting a design for a customer, it’s fairly common to hear something along the lines of, “Oh, by the way, over the years I’ve been...

As we take a design from the conceptual to detail stage, foremost in our mind should be the realization that what we draw WE must build. ...

Here are three common construction mistakes that will bite you in the rear if you aren’t careful. I’ve made all of them. Most of the...

In the past several years I’ve noticed a trend in the scale my customers select for their layouts. N scale now accounts for almost half...

When the term “layout planning” is thrown out, the image that pops into most people’s mind is a track plan with a sidebar that delineates...

When you look at a developing model railroad design it should be from the perspective of having the blinders off and being crystal clear...

The customers I see in my business often have a common history leading up to the time they contact me. Due to time and/or space...

One of the most important layout planning decisions comes early on. Specifically, you need to answer the question, how big should I...

Many years ago the stars aligned and space and resources became available to build my dream layout, an N scale version of the Monon...

When it comes to designing a yard for your model railroad, give some thought to how you’ll keep the activities of your yard switcher...

How high should I make my bench work? As a model railroad designer, the question comes up frequently. It’s an important one as it will...

Just as idle doodling and sketching can be relaxing, so can casually roughing out model railroad design sketches. The initial stages of...

Curb you enthusiasm. Well….not so much curb it but at least keep it in check. The early stages of a model railroad project are...