The Mistral II (+interview!)

One of the most popular MOCs this week is the Mistral II - a massive flying Steampunk ship drawing inspiration from the Eiffel Tower. It's Nathan Proudlove's remake of his original 2006 creation The Mistral. So sit back, and enjoy the pictures whilst reading a short interview I took with Nathan...

John: The Mistral II is the second version of the Mistral, the first version of which was made a few years ago. What gave you the inspiration to remake such an old project, and why now?

Nathan Proudlove: I decided to remake the Mistral on the way home from a show in which it had been displayed. Mistral I was packed loosely in a box in the back seat of my car, (I didn't have very far to drive) when I heard a sickening sound from behind me at a stoplight. The ship had completely disintegrated! I had only had the thing completed for two weeks when it just ceased to be. Structural integrity wasn't exactly a priority with the first one. So I knew it would have to be rebuilt eventually, I just wasn't sure when.

J: This second version is very different to the first, yet keeps some of the unique features. How did you go about redesigning the Mistral I? Did you start from scratch again?

NP: The rope bridges that I had used for trusswork on the original were actually loaned to me by a friend, so when I returned them, I knew I had to come up with something different for the new version. The idea came while sorting, as it so often does, to use the dozens of dark grey struts and large Insectoid legs I had collected, to loosely replicate the iron work in the Eiffel tower as the base of the Mistral II. The command structure above the deck went through many redesigns, and I consulted with a few of my steampunk peers along the way. They gave good solid critique along the way and got me to pay attention to detail in areas I might have otherwise missed.

J: The Mistral II is clearly a Steampunk creation. Did you use any Steampunk pictures or concept art for inspiration? For example, what gave you the idea for the glass house?

NP: The concept for the first version of the Mistral was mostly inspired by the flying aircraft carrier in the film Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. The design of the ship itself was almost exclusively mine though. I simply imagined what a flying aircraft carrier would look like if it were placed in a steampunk setting. The Mistral II, however, took many more design cues from specific sources. I've already mentioned the Eiffel Tower, and the Palais d'Industrie from the Paris World's Fair in 1855 is the source for the glass dome. Mistral II was designed to be elegant, refined and symmetrical, qualities of which the first Mistral possesed none.

Well there you go: anything you ever needed to know about the Mistral! Many thanks to Nathan to answering my questions. I'll [hopefully] see you next week for another interview!


~John