The grandeur of the HMS Victoria will adorn an office in London, 120 years after it sailed out of Grand Harbour and was accidentally rammed and sunk off Tripoli in Lebanon.

This is one of some 40 ships that Joseph Abela brought back to life through scale models which he builds from scratch. It will be exhibited in Andrew Gidden’s office, whose father was a seafarer.

Mr Abela is often commissioned to build models abroad, and his work includes a model of the 16th century flagship La Real, which is the centrepiece at the Lepanto Battle Museum in Nafpaktos, Greece.

His models can also be seen at the Navy Museum in Norway in the rescue boats section, and there are more than 10 models at the Maritime Museum.

He makes no use of plans, but drafts his own following detailed research and thorough leafing through visual documents, paintings and history books.

His love for ship model building was bred in his hometown of Senglea, which is surrounded with boats and ships day and night. He learnt his skill through trial-and-error, and what started off as a hobby has become his job.

Mr Abela, author of The Maltese Merchant Fleet of the 19th century, joined the Museum Department in 1991 and is nowadays the executive keeper of models at the Maritime Museum in Vittoriosa, tasked with building models for Heritage Malta, restoring and taking care of them.

His first commissioned model (by the Gozo Channel) is the Gozo Boat, which he built for the Maritime Museum.

It can take from six months up to two years to finish a model. The HMS Victoria, built at a 1:72 scale took two years to finish and is made of wood, metal and string.

The hardest part of this laborious journey is giving away his models.

“I miss my models. It’s a labour of love... I have spent two whole years building it... thinking about it. I’m lucky I work at the museum because I can go see some of my ‘friends’ whenever I want. This is my life.”