I'm in agreement with Chuck's choices, except I don't know who that VS fellow is? LOL!
Seriously: two model builders and two of their very different models were instrumental in getting me back into the hobby, and striving to be the best that I could be (hum, I've heard that somewhere before), and you find that you are not in competition with anybody but yourself, to build better, to push your imagination, to increase your skills, etc . . .
Here is Pat Covert's "Carnie Wagon," which I am happy to say it is now a part of the Lab-RAT-ory colleciton:
It seems to me a model like this feeds the imagination for years . . . it really ruined me forever in terms of being so addictive . . .
Here is Ken Hamilton's painted model that Pat Covert built . . . (it was one of the first amazing collaborations between two builders! Which resulted in a two-part great article published in Scale Auto Enthusiast (I think, or was it Plastic Fanatic?).