Back in April, the siren song of Warhammer Fest brought fans from far and wide to Manchester – and Warhammer Community took a little detour to the local Warhammer store. These hallowed grounds are home to a famous and timely display – the Blood Angels taking on a monstrous Tyranid invasion.
We spoke to Paul, the long-serving Manchester store manager, about this years-long passion project that just keeps on growing.
Paul: We started in the pandemic – the lockdowns and everything started not long after we moved into this store. I’d already begun to figure out roughly what I wanted from the window display – I knew it was going to use all the space next to the counter, and then go up the wall. The L-shape of the display was intentional – it means that people outside can see it, but then there’s loads more to see once they come inside.
So when we were off in lockdown, all of us were painting Blood Angels and Tyranids. Even when we came back, it was a little bit quieter – we weren’t running events and had reduced hours, which gave me a bit of time to tinker with the display and get it properly laid out, especially on core elements like the tower build.
Since then, we’ve had a target of adding something new each week, whether it’s big or small, so that any time you come back in-store there’s something new to see. At the store anniversary we added a whole new section on the front, and at some point we’re going to expand up and around the other side of the window.
One of the armies had to be Space Marines, so we chose the Blood Angels because they’re bright and eye-catching, and one of the main Chapters. With the Tyranids, because they’re so alien, you can’t help but notice they’re the “bad guys”. We chose Hive Fleet Tiamet because the green is the opposite colour to the red, and gave us one warm army and one cold army.
We’ve left some strategic gaps for when new things get released and we can add them in, but we’ve already got hundreds of miniatures on show. The goal has always been to have every plastic miniature for both the Tyranids and Blood Angels on the display. This means we’ll add all of the forces from Leviathan – and any future releases.* And when we knew there were new models coming, we added some old ones. So in and among the current Genestealers are some of the old first edition Genestealers!
A lot of effort has been spent positioning things, to get a sense of movement going across the whole diorama – there’s a proper horde swarming around everything.
There’s something hidden in every last nook and cranny. The special edition White Dwarf Tech-priest is hidden down a corridor. Any door or entryway has people in there defending. One of my customers – a complete Blood Angels fanatic – was very excited, but complained that we didn’t have a Sanguinor on the board. “That’s the most important character”, he told me! So I said “give me a week, consider it done”. When he came back a week later? The body of the Sanguinor was bleeding out against a wall in the corner…
In the old store we had a scratch-built Emperor Titan which we couldn’t bring with us when we moved, so I cannibalised it for bits. The big gun on top of the tower and all the punisher cannons are taken from that mighty God-Engine – so he still lives on!
The whole display looks particularly good at night because all the interior is blue-lit, and there are orange LEDs around it so you can really notice the interior parts.
The giant Tyranid bio-ship is mostly polystyrene and cardboard, because we have to hang it from the ceiling – which means I can lift it with one hand. All the explosions, laser blasts, rockets firing, and other things are tinfoil, wrapped around various different types of stick and painted.
These photos can’t do Paul’s work true justice, so why not pop into the Manchester store and gaze in awe upon their display in person? And if other Warhammer stores are watching, let us know if you’re planning something similar!
* What, even more new Tyranids and Space Marines? Chance, would be a fine thing, eh Paul?
