February 22nd, 2011 14 comments

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Doctor Who Experience – Restoration of a Tardis

The Restoration of a Tardis

Anyone visiting The Doctor Who Experience will see the 4th Doctors Tardis in all its glory – but it didn’t always look like that. In the words and pictures of the restorer Mark Barton Hill (free lance prop artist and FAN) here’s how it was done.

“The story is like this, My good Friend Andrew Beech asked me to carry out the work as he was impressed with a replacement lamp and door sign I made for the Tardis he owns, so I spent 3 months collecting and playing with suitable blue paints, researching, watching DVD’s and developing techniques of distressing and weathering.

I then collected the prop from The Doctor Who studios in Wales, brought it to Olympia and started to work on it there in situ every day for two weeks in January. It was in a dreadful state of disrepair, covered in a thick layer of dust, no base plinth, wrong signage, no door pull sign, broken windows and no Lamp!”

Below: The Tardis being wheeled in Olympia and the start of the restoration work…

“I washed it, sanded it, and then painstakingly re-built the base plinth and started painted it layer by layer, staring with quite a light shade of blue and
gradually getting darker with a wipe on, wipe off technique using about 5 different blues and finished with a black wash – just to get that season 18 feel.”

On its Way: The various stages of restoration…

“I replaced some of the windows with replicas I made myself and made a new lamp and signage, which are all hand painted. I used stories such as ‘The Leisure Hive’ and Warrior’s Gate’ as colour pallet reference.”

The Tardis Restored: The Tardis as seen in the exhibition and Mark with his finished work (image courtesy of Rii Schroer)…

Mark also assembled the console room wall panels, made ALL the 40 roundels and painted it and lit it. he was also responsible for the sound effects too!

In progress: The walls of the fifth Doctors Tardis…

The finished product: Mark steps inside the fifth Doctor Tardis with the finished walls in the background (image courtesy of Rii Schroer)…

The Doctor Who Experience: Tickets for the show in London are on sale now via www.doctorwhoexperience.com. You can also keep up to date via the Doctor Who Experience Twitter page.

And finally: many of you will have already the Video of Peter Davison’s spectacular arrival at Gallifrey 22 but if you haven’t then towards the end it features both the props shown above!

Other places of interest…

Longleat Exhibition – fascinating site on the history and exhibits of Longleat.

Police Boxes – A history of the police box and Tardis.

The Tardis – our own comprehensive section on the Doctors Type 40.