Every medieval tavern should have a hearth with a crackling fire to warm the face and fingers from a hard day's adventuring.
The wall and flooring I've painted using exactly the same colouring as the previous tavern spit roast. This piece has a larger fire, and a couple of sphinx-esque statues on either side of the grate. These, along with the hearthstones, I did in cold grey (GW codex) and faintly drybrushed the edges with bonewhite. I particularly like the mangey old dog snoozing by the hearth stones.
I painted this fire before I did the spit roast, and I think I got the red/orange/yellow balance better on the spit roast. I might go back and re-do the flames on this at some stage - they look a touch, I don't know, squidgy. Hard to describe exactly what I mean, but I'm not completely happy with the look. I used tinny tin (GW tin bitz) for the fire pokers in the left hand sphinx's arms, and for the grating around the fire.
I finished off with the dog and the empty bottle on the floor.
And to complete the snug, there's the corner tables and chairs - all made from old beer barrels.
I used the same trick of doing a black ink wash over the barrels to give them a different shade of brown to the rest of the wood. The trays are light leather brown, washed with brown ink, and the goblets and spitoons are all in tinny tin again. I think the skull candle holders really add character to the scene (bonewhite on a black undercoat, leaving the eye sockets black, and adding a thin black ink wash over to lowlight the cheek and forehead crevices).
I can almost see the rough shod cluster of mud encrusted travellers gathered around the candle flames. Next time, there's just a couple more kitchen pieces to do (the prep table and the ovens/cooking ranges). Then we'll be moving onto my favourite type of outdoor terrain - RUINS!
PS - in case anyone fancies a go at the medieval tavern themselves, the pieces are all for sale in the UK from dungeon castings. You have to rummage a bit to find them in the listings, but they're all there. I think they come in two or three separate kits. http://dungeoncastings.co.uk
