We have finally finished the Experience SMC page on this website, on which we highlight several other not-to-miss events and artists that we welcome at this year’s event.

The page also contains the list of clubs at SMC.

For the early and sporty birds amongst us, there will be a squash tournament on Friday evening from 18:00 to 21:00 organised by no other then Karol Rudyk. Limited spots are available, so if you are interested to play along, send an email to Karol. Rackets can be rented at NH Koningshof for a modest € 5. 

Of course we welcome back the Kitbash Challenge by Plainries, as well as the ever so entertaining Speed Painting Contest managed by our friends of Chestnut Ink.

But there is more: We have illustrator and concept artist Daniel Zrom present at the stand of Hera Models, graphic designer Noemi Rosano with her own stand Suzume Sun 3D and from our hometown Eindhoven we welcome Evi Van der Vorst Scenics.

On Saturday afternoon our friend Mikael Blank will conduct a free seminar in which he talks about how colours can be heaven or hell. A highly recommended seminar indeed.

And of course, SMC wouldn’t be complete without a stand of The Model Philosopher. This year the stand will be spiced up with models of artists that have been guest on the podcast.

Read more on the Experience SMC page of the SMC website.

 

In 2024 SMC was busier than ever. During this edition, we noticed that at times the aisles were difficult to navigate due to the increased crowds. This not only created inconvenience for visitors, but it also posed safety risks. We want to ensure that a visit to SMC remains safe and enjoyable for everyone.

At the current location, NH Koningshof, there is no possibility to increase SMC’s total exhibition area.  To ensure sufficient flow, and to maintain a pleasant atmosphere, we have had to decide to limit the space available for club stands.  As a result, we will be able to invite fewer clubs for  SMC.

We understand that this is a disappointment, especially for the clubs that participate with great enthusiasm every year. We greatly appreciate their efforts and are looking for ways to better fit club stands into the available space.  In doing so, we continue to strive for a balance between a vibrant programme and a safe, accessible environment for all visitors.

We hope for your understanding and to welcome everybody as visitors SMC 2025.

This is what SMC’s provisional format looks like:

Crowd Management

As most visitors of SMC 2024 will acknowledge, the overwhelming amount of visitors on both days, but especially on Saturday has forced us to think about measures that will hopefully result in a smoother flow of several aspects of the show.

One of the measures we take to improve crowd control at SMC is to extend the opening hours of the show a bit, as well as the time we close the contest area for judging.

Keeping the contest area open during judging is impossible, as it’s simply too busy around the contest tables for the judges to perform their already difficult task.
In order to tackle that issue a little, we have decided that at SMC 2025 the contest area will close to the public at 15:30, instead of 15:00 on Saturday.

We also open the doors to the public half an hour earlier, both on Saturday and Sunday, meaning we open at 9:30 instead of 10:00.

Obviously there will be more to mention about this subject, but we’ll get back you on that later.

SMC 2024 is already history, but just saying it was successful is an understatement. It was a blast. We broke our own records again. The SMC record, that is. We also did a WME in 2022, as some of you may remember, but even those numbers come close except for number of contest entries.

The numbers:

• 89 volunteers were present over 4 days to make the show to a success.
• We had 2.772 models in the contest, by 708 artists, from 39 countries.
• There were a dazzling 172 vendors divided over 150 vendor stands.
• And most of all, we welcomed an unprecedented number of over 5.000 visitors

Although it is impossible to make everybody happy, the amount of smiling faces throughout the weekend, natural or stimulated by a surplus of adult beverages in the evenings, the atmosphere during the event, was heart-warming.

 

 

 

The teamwork during the show, but also during both days of building up the show on Thursday and Friday was better than ever, even with a good number of “first-timers”. Our club members and their helping partners surely made the difference.

And a special thank you for lending their helping hands goes out to the members of the British Flat Figure Society, Jan Willem Mol and Gaby Tysarzik.

The workshops on Friday, for the first time, were surely a success and that concept will be repeated next year. Stay tuned for more, as always, we have a lot of surprises up our sleeve.

We saw three awesome Best of Show awards for Ordnance, Fantasy and Historical Figures and for the first time a Best of Juniors “Arie van Kessel” Trophy.
Arie van Kessel,  a long-standing member of our club Scale Model Factory, and the driving force behind the Kids Club at SMC passed away in February 2024 and this trophy is in memory of him.

The contest results, a million photos of the contest entries by Eric Reits, the Best of Shows are published on this page.

That page also includes links to a random selection of video reports on SMC 2024 that we found on the internet. Thanks to all who found our event worthwhile and spent time registering it in moving and non-moving pictures.

 

Change in classes for Fantasy Figures in 2025

During the award ceremony we announced that we will introduce a new class in the fantasy figure painting category. In between standard and master’s classes there will be an intermediate class, we will call advanced.

As you may have noticed or experienced, the skill level in masters is changing so fast, and is at such a high level with many professional and full-time painters, that it is becoming increasingly difficult for pure hobbyists with limited time to paint to keep up and make the step from standard to masters, especially if they win a gold medal, which forces them move a level up.

In order to keep the motivation up we have decided to add this advanced level in the contest and you are free to register at that level as you see fit.

And now ?

The large number of visitors also imposes new challenges in crowd control and lay out of our floorplan. Both matters will be addressed by our team next year. Since we cannot increase the overall size of the show in terms of square meters, it will mean that there will be a significant change of the basic floorplan and set up if the show in 2025, but please rest assured that we will come with an even better experience for all next year.

SMC 2025 will be held on October 18 and 19, 2025, with some workshops on Friday 17th .
Be there and make the difference!