Simple country roads for ECW games

I was looking at some of the photos of the English Civil War games recently, in particular the grey felt I use for my roads. While being quite functional they do look rather modern for the period.

Grey felt roads while practical and easy to make don't look much like country lanes

Over the last few months I have been painting felt for my Western Desert games and having bought some brown felt recently I thought it was time to try and create some ECW country roads. Here are the steps I took...

Cut felt into strips - mine are 2 inches wide 

I lightly brushed on a sand colour. Trying to make the centre lighter where the road is less worn by carts.

Dots and dashes of green are applied to represent areas where grass has grown.

A closer look - all paint is casually applied.

Using a brown marker pen ruts are drawn.

The end result on the tabletop.

Once painted I applied a watered down glue (1 part glue and 4 parts water) to seal the paint. This also has the advantage of reducing the felt getting snagged on a units base when moving.

Using a sealer on the felt reduces the likelihood of snagging.

If the lengths of road are not long enough I use masking tape to join the pieces and keep it neat and tidy.

Masking tape used to join lengths of road.

Next I will look at the felt I use to show wooded areas.