In a miniature world, climate change and environmental issues loom large

HAMBURG, Germany (AP) — Watching his dad make a brand-new miniature train car look old, placing the wooden parts to weather in the sun and rain, pulled Peter Martínez into the world of miniatures. He recalls his father, who made model trains mostly for collectors or hobbyists, wondering why anyone would pay him to do what he thought was the most fun part of the hobby.

“But luckily they did, and we were able to build an industry around it,” Martínez said.

The Argentine family business, United Scale Arts, is now partnering with Germany’s Miniatur Wunderland, a museum that houses the largest model train set in the world, to develop new exhibits depicting parts of South America, including the Amazon rainforest and Atacama Desert. But with miniature power comes great responsibility — and both Martínez’s company and the museum are determined that the miniature world reflect both the good and bad of the real thing.

Real world problems

So alongside the perfectly shaded rocks and trees, they depict poverty, crime and environmental degradation. In the exhibits already running in Hamburg, built by a team that has grown over the years to hundreds of people, it means that tiny trains pull tiny coal cars into a mining town, but also, on a city bridge, a tiny semitruck hauls the tiny giant blade of a wind turbine.

And the builders say it means the new models won’t shy away from illustrating real life in the Amazon: they will include scenes of illegal mining, deforestation and forest fires.

“These are social problems that exist in the real world, and we need to show them also in the models, because I think it’s important not to make this kind of idealistic view of the world, but also to show reality and to use these tools as a learning experience for everyone that visits the Wunderland,” Martínez said.

Replicas of famous landmarks

Visitors have a lot to see in the multistory warehouse that is Wunderland. From Las Vegas to Miami Beach, from Rio de Janeiro to Monaco, cars zoom past tiny replicas of buildings as throngs of people, with heads smaller than your fingernail, mill about famous landmarks.

Cargo ships dominate the glasslike surface of a tiny bay as they chug in with their deliveries. Planes taxi down the runway of an airport. And of course, plenty of trains roll through every landscape to the delight of kids and adults alike.

‘A dream come true’

Twin brothers Gerrit and Frederik Braun joined with business partner Stephan Hertz and took out a loan to create Miniatur Wunderland after they left the nightclub business. Frederik had visited a model railroad shop in Zurich, called his brother and suggested they create their own — but a whole lot bigger.

Gerrit laughed at first. Unlike his brother, he loved the nightclub. But he eventually agreed and now can’t imagine doing anything else.

“It’s a dream come true that we sit here 25 years later, and playing all day,” he said, chuckling.

Serious work mixed with play

But he takes the work seriously. The brothers came up with most of the initial plans for the museum within two weeks, Gerrit said. It’s grown in scope and ambition since then.

“Ten years ago, we were looking to the old section and saw the real world has changed in this time,” Gerrit said. They realized they needed to update the exhibits to include technologies like electric cars, wind turbines, nuclear power and more. “I have children, and I believe in global warming and I’m sure that we have done it … So if you believe in this, and you have the possibility to show the images, why not?”

Political issues

There’s no one process by which the designers and model builders decide what to include in their models, but as they have added to the collection, they haven’t shied away from depicting technology or from political or contentious topics.

In 2017, when Donald Trump was first elected U.S. president, the Wunderland put up a model concrete wall with barbed wire around the section with the American landscapes. In 2019, Wunderland launched a scathing exhibit on the treatment of animals in large-scale farming that sparked deep criticism from the agriculture industry.

Next came weeks of conversation, farm visits and the eventual launch of a special exhibit aimed at depicting the current reality of pig farming, featuring industrial production and organic farms.

They’re usually striving to depict the world exactly as it is. But building models also reminds Gerrit that “you can build the world a little bit like you want,” he said.

Feelings of nostalgia

It’s an art form that can have practical purposes but also can capture longing, nostalgia or other feelings about a particular time or place, said Kit Maxwell, a curator with The Art Institute of Chicago, which houses the popular Thorne Miniature Rooms.

“One of the most compelling things about these rooms is that you imagine yourself in them,” he said.

Aware of that power of imagination,Martínez also said builders have to be careful not to unfairly cast countries in a bad light as they seek to include imperfections.

“You need to kind of balance, when you show the bad things in contrast with the good things, that they are not overdone or they are not too much,” he said. “You want also that the people that go there have a good time and not get really sad after seeing this model.”

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Follow Melina Walling on X @MelinaWalling and Bluesky @melinawalling.bsky.social.

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