The English Army 1415-1429 (Perry Miniatures) 28mm (Finished)

So after quite a long time I've managed to finish my box of men at arms and archers. I do wish I had been a bit more adventurous with the jupons for the men at arms and the patterns for the archers gambesons but I stuck to simple designs so I wouldn't ruin them!

It was a great set to work on, although I would have liked to have had a wider variety of poses for the archers, there are only so many times nock, draw and loose can be interesting. I decided against arming any archers with melee weapons but maybe that would have given me more choice in poses.

Men at Arms

Archers

Darksphere - Wargaming supplies, Waterloo, London

I accidentally came across this shop a few months ago when I was looking to get hold of some supplies at short notice, I didn't fancy waiting for eBay or any other mail order suppliers. At first glance it's very hard to tell what this place even is, it's situated under an archway in the railway bridge about 5 minutes from Waterloo station. Inside though is an Aladdin's cave of modelling and gaming goodies!

The first time I went here the whole shop was crammed with people playing a fantasy card game (although I didn't look close enough to see which one). They were selling packs of cards by the cart load and even had dustbins set up at the end of the gaming benches so people could get rid of their packets easily!

The shops itself has a really good selection of models, card games, board games and other handy things. I bought my Tiger from this shop as well as a tonne of paintbrushes, paints and sprays. It can be hard to find what you're looking for but the staff are always really helpful! So helpful in fact that when I asked a general question about some matt varnish the assistant even started looking on Google for me to see if it's the stuff I wanted!

The selection of models is huge and they are always really well stocked, to give you an example the image below is of one of their shelves (photo taken from the Dark Sphere website).

I've not yet ordered anything from their website as I only work around the corner and so can always find time to pop in, but I think the website does let the shop down a bit. It feels clunky and slightly dated and a lot of the products don't have photographs to match - whilst this isn't a problem if you know what you want to buy it can be a pain if you're just browsing. 

Overall though I love this shop and sadly it's prejudiced my views of smaller model retailers and shops because I look at how much these guys stock and think that it's shame nobody else does but I guess anything is possible if you've got that much space!

It's well worth a visit if you're in the London area and is literally a 5 minute walk from Lambeth North or Waterloo stations.

Dark Sphere 
Arch 186 Hercules Road 
London
SE1 7LD

Tel: 020 7928 1373