by jerry7171

This is a (rough) model of the Nike monument from the island of Samothrace as it appeared post WWI until the restoration that started in 2013.

The trireme prow, when the pieces were brought to the Louvre in the 19th century, was missing large chunks. The gaps were filled in for stability but were left visible. The filled gaps could be seen as slightly recessed areas around the prow.

The statue of Nike was originally set atop the prow, but during a later restoration in the 20th century, the statue was moved atop a large block that in turn was set up inside the prow. The block was a utility to lift the statue higher to make it more visible from the stairs of the Daru Staircase.

This was the manner the monument was displayed and presented to visitors until 2013. At that time, the statue was removed and underwent an extensive study and conservation. The prow pedestal was completely disassembled, studied, cleaned, then rebuilt with the addition of 3D-scanned copies of missing parts from it recovered in Samothrace.

The Nike Monument looks different today since it was carefully cleaned up to reveal the original Parian and Lartos marbles, and the entire thing set atop a low pedestal to protect it from visitors. The block the statue had been set on was detached and not reused. Once again the Winged Victory stands on the trireme.

How I Designed This

I scoured the internet for photos to use for the prow. I couldn't find enough sharp, high quality photos to completely reconstruct the prow in a detailed manner. As for the Nike statue, I used the available model from here: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:196038. The model is superb. The only anachronistic feature is the partial upper left arm which was removed during one of the early restorations in the 20th century. But that little detail probably won't stand out.

I used Agisoft Metashape to reconstruct the prow. I used medium settings as there wasn't enough information to model it at a higher resolution. I used Meshmixer to fix holes in the mesh and to try to sculpt the prow to balance the symmetry. I then imported the model back into Metashape to decimate further without losing the details it had.

I checked the model in both Meshmixer and Netfabb to make sure it is printable.

I haven't tried to print it yet as my printer is broke down and I'm waiting on a part.