Ian McLaughlan

I have made model ships from the age of 10 but with some very major gaps to due to the demand of my ex-profession and to domestic requirements. Many years ago I retired to Salisbury in Wiltshire where I have been able to take up model making once again. Having worked at 1:144 on a scratch built basis for several years building American Schooners, old age has encouraged me to collapse on to 1:96. Currently I am building a model of the British Sloop of War HMS Wolf from a ShipYard paper kit, however I am using the kit as a template to produce a wooden model. I intend to stick to this scale as I find it ideal for display in a domestic environment. My future model making will be focused on sloops of war. The reason for this is that I wrote a book about these small warships which have been neglected in that respect despite the fact that by the end of the Napoleonic War they were the largest class in most Atlantic navies.

I am now keen to reproduce in three dimensions some of those subjects that I illustrated in two dimensions in my book. This leads me to the point that I am an amateur marine painter working in water-colour, oils and pastel. I also produce many pen and pencil drawings. 

I belong, in England, to a small society called "The Society of Model Shipwrights". A founding member of this Society was John Bowen, who was also the editor of that excellent quarterly "Model Shipwright". The Society has always been committed to producing models of museum standard to perfect scale in Sail and Steam. 

My other interests are maintaining and sailing a small wooden yacht; 56 years old so she is a bit younger than me; playing folk music on the guitar; writing about sloops of war and some occasional cooking!