Of those, we are guessing that few readers will not at some point have either built, owned, or lusted after a Tamiya model kit at some point over the last many decades, so it’s with some sadness ...

Shunsaku Tamiya, who turned his family’s plastic model business into a global brand, held a scale replica of a German World War II Tiger tank at the hobby show in Shizuoka, Japan, in 2003.