Different Scales for Different Folks
When it comes to Toy Soldiers, there are several prominent international brands in the market, such as King & Country and First Legion. Those of you who are familiar with them would immediately notice that we chose a rather uncommon scale of 1/26 for our figures.
So why the unusual scale? Why didn’t we stick to 1/30 – the more conventional scale used by other big brands? These are questions that many collectors asked when we first introduced our line of Singapore Army and Singapore Heritage Figures.
The reason is actually due to the unique preferences of our local customers in Singapore. They prefer slightly larger figurines. Many of them are military men who present our figurines as gifts to officials. And as we all know, when it comes to public presentations, bigger is usually better.
But Is The Difference Really Noticeable?
Many hardcore collectors of the other big brands were hesitant to give our figurines a try at first. They already had large collections, and were worried that our figures would look out of place.
We agonized over this at first. So we did a side-by-side comparison of the actual figurines with ours. Turns out, the difference wasn’t so noticeable at all.
If we were to translate real-life height to figurine scale, our figurines would be about 6.9cm tall, whilst the 1/30 ones would be 6cm tall – a difference of about 1cm. However, we found that this was not the case with the actual figurines.
First off – not all figurines are posed standing upright. Some are crouching, kneeling, or even mounted. This makes it tricky to measure height precisely.
Next, we found that different brands had their own unique look & feel for their figurines. King & Country’s figurines, for example, are a little more chunky in design. Nothing wrong with that at all – they still look great, by the way.
This was when we realised: manufacturers seldom produce their figurines to an absolute accuracy of scale. Instead, it is the unique design of the brand, as well as the different figurine poses, that create subtle differences in size.
Take a look at these pictures of our figurines alongside some 1/30 scale ones.
Side-By-Side Comparison of Our Figures
Miniature Stories’ Samsui Woman figure (left-most), and Chinese Woman (right-most), with King & Country’s Japanese soldier figures (middle).
Miniature Stories’ Chinese woman and Medicine Man figures (left-most), alongside First Legion’s Samurai mounted on horse figure.
Left Picture: Miniature Stories’ Majie figure (right), with First Legion’s Samurai.
Right Picture: Miniature Stories’ Medicine Man in between King & Country’s German and Himmler figures.
King & Country’s 1/30 Figures Inside Our 1/26 Shophouse Model (Working Version)
Goodness, what are WWII troopers doing inside a Singapore Shophouse? Don’t worry – it’s just to illustrate that 1/30 scale figures look perfectly fine in a 1/26 scale building model.
Displaying Our Singapore Heritage Figures with Streets of Old Hong Kong
King & Country’s Streets of Old Hong Kong is a beautiful series from which we drew quite a bit of inspiration. Some of their collectors have since been convinced that the difference in our scale was not an issue. So they added our Singapore Heritage figurines to their collection, making for a truly impressive display. Here’s one of them:
Miniature Stories’ Singapore Heritage figures amongst King & Country’s Streets of Old Hong Kong series.
Can you see a difference in scale? Not us…
Conclusion
Our figurines are in 1/26 scale, which is technically different from the conventional 1/30 used by major Toy Soldier brands. As you have seen however, the difference is usually not noticeable in person. This is due to varying poses and the different brands’ design look & feel of their figures.
Many times, they look perfectly fine when displayed together in the same collection.
We hope this clarifies any doubts that you previously had about whether or not our figurines can be integrated to your existing collection of 1/30 scale figures. Purchase with peace of mind and let us know how they fit in with your displays!
All Singapore Heritage Figurines shown are available here.