Artist brings Edinburgh's historic pubs and landmarks to life with 3D miniature models
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Keith Crawley's miniature creations serve as a tribute to Edinburgh's history
An artist is recreating Edinburgh's pubs and historic landmarks as miniature models using 3D printing technology.
Keith Crawley, 58, from Granton, has recreated 50 of the city's pubs alongside complex projects such as Dalhousie Castle, combining computer design, 3D printing and hand painting.
An artist by trade since 2004 who previously painted portraits and film scenes, Mr Crawley's journey into miniature modelling began when he decided to create a model of his own home.
“I was looking to try something different, something new,” Keith said.
“I thought, I wonder if I could make a model of my house on the computer and then 3D print it just to see what it would look like.”
“I still do the odd painting now and then but the models have pretty much taken up my time.
“You could say work is getting in the way of work,” he said.
After seeing the finished result, Keith decided to try making something with wider appeal and turned his attention to Edinburgh pubs.
His first creation was the Auld Hundred pub, which received such a positive reaction that he decided to keep going.
“I just started to make Edinburgh pubs and eventually I started to get commissions,” he said.
Commissions have since flooded in from people wanting to recreate places where they have met their partners, spent their university years or made memories, as well as pub owners wanting miniature versions of their own business. With Edinburgh boasting hundreds of pubs, Keith says he reckons he won't be falling short of work anytime soon.
Describing his creative process, he photographs virtually every detail of the building from guttering and paving to windows, signs, and anything unusual about the architecture.
He then creates the building digitally before using polylactic acid (PLA) filament on a 3D printer, printing it in sections and assembling the pieces by hand.
“It’s a kit. The only difference is you have to make all of the parts first before you put the kit together,” Keith said.
He explained that a typical pub can take around a week to complete, although more complicated projects can take considerably longer.
His model of Dalhousie Castle took around three months to complete, with Keith using photographs and even drone footage to help capture the historic buildings intricate details.
He said roofs can be the most difficult part capturing as they are hard to see from ground level.
“Roofs are always tricky, because obviously you can't really see that sort of thing from ground level,” he said.
Keith believes that his creations serve an important purpose in preserving Edinburgh’s history and the memories people associate with it.
“I call them slices of Edinburgh, but I suppose there will be slices of time as well,” he said.
He recently allowed his followers to choose his 50th Edinburgh pub, with Doctors on Forrest Road narrowly beating The Blue Blazer, on Spittal Street, after Keith resorted to a coin toss to decide between the two.
Now Keith is preparing to take on one of his biggest challenges yet as part of the Spirit of Leithers project, where he is recreating Leith’s historic old Kirkgate - an area that was all but wiped from the map in the 1960s. The project is expected to take up to eight months and could feature around 50 buildings.
With much of the original area demolished, Keith is now solely relying on historic photographs, Google Maps and information from local history groups to piece it together. But it is the reaction that keeps Keith going, where the hours of work put into his models makes it all worthwhile.
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