All of my lighthouses are covered in Dryvit, an exterior insulation and finish system of unmatched quality. It is a multi-step system of first, expended polystyrene core, second, a layer of fiberglass mesh embedded in a thin set like cement, and third, a semi-smooth textured acrylic finish is floated to perfection. Then they all get as many as seven coats of high quality paint in some areas to complete the line patterns. I do not shoot finish from a gun, as that texture is not smooth enough.

All of my "wooden pieces" are made of a 1/4" rounding on the edges of the 3/4" thick pieces of Medex exterior MDF boards that will last for many, many years and will never delaminate or split. I have been using it for about 5 years and have tried to make it fail many ways unsuccessfully. I have soaked painted pieces in a bucket of water for months, froze and thaw painted pieces day after day for months,I have even cooked painted pieces in a pressure cooker and the paint and Medex pieces both come out fine. When I used to use any kind of plywood, it would eventually start to split or delaminate. So now, all the lighthouses have one inch of salt treated wood on the bottom, rounded over and used to get the lighthouse off the ground.

All of my windows, doors, and corbels are custom made fr UV resistant plastic. I do not use any doll house pieces, because expansion and contraction on these joints usually make them fail.

All of my wire railing on the landings are splice together for a seamless connection that you are hard pressed to find and are vinyl coated to prevent bleeding rust stains.

All my larger lighthouses from 12' and up are reinforced in the center with a galvanized steel pipe under tension. The 12' and up sizes also all have 1 1/2" thick landings, which is more size appropriate for their larger lamps and size.

In short don't be fooled into buying a lesser quality lighthouse. Why not purchase one of my quality lighthouses at a reasonable price and be satisfied for many, many years to come?