Sylvie's smile holds a touch of mischief as she leans toward Eli, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. "Eli", she says, "don't forget—we're not merely beautiful young women tonight. No, we're enchantresses, weaving spells in the moonlight."

Eli's azure eyes widen, and Sylvie continues, her tone filled with reverence. "Remember, our clutches—crafted by Mademoiselle Élise herself—are more than mere accessories. They hold secrets woven by moonlight and dreams spun from stardust." Sylvie glances at her 'Dazzling Star' clutch, its celestial threads shimmering.

She leans in, her gaze locking with Eli's. "Never forget", her voice a conspiratorial whisper, "How Mademoiselle Élise confided in us. Our clutches—crafted 'as requested by Lady Penelope to capture the most discerning eyes'—hold more than mere elegance."

Sylvie lowers her voice further, as if sharing a forbidden secret. "And my mother", she continues, "instructed Mademoiselle Élise to debit her account in full. These clutches—specially made—are destined for tonight, the Christmas Ball my mother's been organising with such meticulous care."

Eli leans closer, her eyes reflecting the flicker of firelight. "But Sylvie", she whispers, "there are three not just two clutches. That 'Silver Moon' clutch... Mademoiselle Élise wove it with moonbeams and destiny, but who for?"

Sylvie nods, her smile holding mystery. "I gave it to my mother", she replies, "and she will know its intended recipient. Of that, I'm certain. Mademoiselle Élise is never wrong."

Eli's breath catches. Lady Trevelver—the elegant matriarch who moved through society like a queen—had initiated these exquisite gifts. Their clutches, with their magical secrets, resting on a nearby table, tissue-unwrapped and waiting, were not just precious accessories but weavers of fate, carefully crafted at Sylvie's mother's command.

And so, in the intimacy of Sylvie's boudoir, the two lovely young women, wrapped in their figure-hugging silk dressing gowns, raise their glasses—a silent toast to Mademoiselle Élise and her clutches, Lady Trevelver and the Ball, and the mysteries that weave lives together.

Hmmph. Splitter! 

Love the scenery mick.

Something a little different tonight. I was able to use the 'Up' line so a slightly different perspective to the normal 'Down' main. A few are aware I have compiled a couple of BR Blue trains and so I present to you...............

Blue class 52 D1043 'Western Duke' with a train of blue/grey MK1s

Class 52 Western Duke with train on Heatherley by Mick Hollyoake, on Flickr

Blue class 35 Hymek D7036 with some blue parcels stock

Class 35 Hymek in blue with parcels on Heatherley by Mick Hollyoake, on Flickr

Thanks for looking in

Offering old tooled models at 'attractive prices' doesn't seem to be their MO (unlike Dapol). Farish effectively homogenise the cost of items, so a steam loco is £150 or whatever. Hence you end up with dinosaurs like the 170 being the same as a brand new 158.

They could always do a re-run of their existing V2! It's a decent-looking model despite the solid wheels and boiler skirt. I love my LNER apple-green one. The cost of the tooling must have been long written-off, so Farish could offer it for an attractive price. There'd be lots of outrage about it not being up to modern standards, but I bet it would sell in reasonable numbers. Come on Bachmann, you know you want to.
PW

That's obviously quite the leap. One presumes they think they can't make adequate margin on steam locos (or that there aren't any 'obvious' ones to go at), I'm sure they're not doing it to spite the market.

It does appear, from the outside at least, that some of their decisions are a little odd. They announced the TPE and SWT 350/450s about 6 years ago, and neither has yet been released, despite being just a re-livery (they tenuously call the 450 a new tooling because they need to fill the holes left by the pantograph, not the well, but the actual 1mm screw holes). During that time both liveries have become obsolete, so I guess adding SWR brings them up to date, but I do question how short their memory is given the propensity for discounting the original run in the far more widespread LM livery, and the lack of other modern 3rd rail EMUs. There is little nothing RTR to go with an SWR 350 after all. They've not done a 159 yet, which is the only obvious bed fellow.

Still, we're getting new models, and that's great. Just need some DB 90s please.

NBL Type 2 Class 21/29
MK1 TPO Stowage Van & TPO Stowage Brake
Oakbank Oil Co./BP 40 Ton bogie tank wagon

Quote from: NeMo on Yesterday at 06:51:29 PM

Quote from: njee20 on Yesterday at 11:22:19 AMHave been meaning to do a LNWR 350 for a while, and at £400 I'll keep thinking about doing one I've already got

That was exactly my reaction. I think I paid about £100 for my Class 350, and a lovely train it is too.

But £400 for essentially the same model? At first, I was like, "Okay, a bit steep, but presumably it's been rejigged to have a single DCC decoder, electrical connections between the carriages, and a built-in loudspeaker". But nope. It's the same model as far as I can tell. Needs three DCC decoders (one for the power car, and two for the headlights in each cab). Livery application looks lovely, in all fairness, but some of the weaker aspects of the first release (like the crudely-modelled high voltage cables between the cars) aren't any different.

While I am really pleased to see a LNWR-liveried 'Desiro', an RRP of £400 doesn't seem (to me) priced to sell.

I guess time will tell!

Cheers,

NeMo

Rails have them priced at £330, but given your comments above that still looks a fair amount of bunce for a model that hasn't been upgraded. I guess it just depends on how much people want those particular variants/liveries.

Personally I do struggle with the commercial logic for some of the releases we see and I seem to recall that not so many years ago we were seeing the original run Desiros in the Bargain bin for even less than £100.

Conversely I struggle to understand the lack of even a single new tool steam loco from Farish since the 8F was announced over 7 years ago. Even appreciating that as time marches on there is a wider range of eras to cover, nonetheless there are a good number of steam locos that would be immensely popular. For starters the most recent OO releases include the 94xx and V2 both of which would go down well (the 94xx was an ever present in the Farish range from 1970 until the mid to late "noughties").

Yes, we are seeing some very nicely executed Next18/sound upgrades from amongst the later coreless motor loco-drive steam models which are very welcome and appear to have gone down well, plus the LMS "Twins" show recognition of the popularity of the steam/diesel transition era, but the lack of new steam from Bachmann remains very perplexing, not least because we have seen new steam models from Sonic, EFE and still have the 43xx and Battle of Britain to come from Dapol which I believe are in or close to tooling  .

Roy

I hope things have gone well for you in the move Martin @port perran . Here is one for you to chill out to from the wonderful Solstice, fairly hot of the press with Ebony Buckle taking over on vocals...

https://youtu.be/qQoDyRQm46g?si=XzzzbDmafCQC7Hy9

Bliss...

Cheers,

Tim