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Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Biggest matchstick model-world record set by
David Reynolds
SWAYTHLING, Southampton, UK -- David Reynolds,
51, has spent 15 years (32,000 hours) and £5,000 creating
the replica of the Brent Bravo oil rig in the North Sea, (where
he used to work), named "Cathedrals of the Sea",
using 4.75m matches-setting the new world record for the Biggest
matchstick model.
Photo: Mr Reynolds has spent 15 years
creating the Biggest
matchstick model / Photo SWNS
(enlarge
photo)
The Biggest
matchstick model has 4,075,000 million individual
matchsticks, weighs one tonne and is 12ft tall and 21ft long.
"It's nice after all these years to have
all this recognition," he told the BBC News website.
The previous Guinness world record for the
Biggest
matchstick model was a recreation of the Titanic using
3.5million.
Mr Reynolds, who lives with his wife Julie,
49, in Southampton, described the remarkable model as a hobby
which 'got out of hand'.
Mr. Reynolds, who was medically retired
in 1998, first started work on the replica of the Brent Bravo
rig in the summer of 1994. The former engineer, who worked
on temporary oil rigs in the 1980s, has recreated the platform,
which he has dubbed the Cathedrals of the Sea, in painstaking
detail.
"As the saying goes, I think I just got
a bit carried away, I didn't think it would be this big. "If
anyone wants to beat it I wish them good luck, I know how
long it takes."
He spent between two and ten hours a day
dabbling with the model - a total of 32,000 hours over the
15 year labour of love.
Everything is built to the finest detail, including
the accommodation block for the rig workers, the flotilla
of ships moored to the rig, the platforms and towers.
He gathered used matches from work colleagues
but his main source was from a wholesaler, dramatically trimming
the cost. David said: “If I had bought all those matches from
the cornershop it would have cost me about £46,000. It actually
cost me £1,600, which works out at about £100 a year.”
The model became so big it had to be split into
14 different sections and housed in various rooms throughout
his home.
It was finally assembled into one piece at the
Bursledon Brickworks Museum in Southampton in March this year.
Mr Reynolds, who made the Biggest
matchstick model in his spare time, said he was going
to destroy it earlier this year because he had no where to
put it. He then contacted the museum where it has been displayed
in its complete form for the first time.
The Biggest
matchstick model is on display at Bursledon Industrial
Brickworks Museum, Swanwick. Mr Reynolds says he has been
contacted by museums in the US who have offered to buy it.
'I've had a few museums contact me to say they want to buy
it and there's even been an offer from Hollywood.'
Wife Julie, 49, is less effusive. 'I am
absolutely sick to death at the sight of a matchstick but
I think there is still more to come, unfortunately,' she said
from their Southampton home. 'But at least I know where he
is and what he's doing, so I'd rather have him there than
down the pub.'
Mr. Reynolds is currently working
on a fleet of historic ships - all made out of matchsticks.
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Tuesday,
October 20, 2009
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