Set Review - BrickCon 2023 - Convention Model

I’m a little late on this one as BrickCon 2023 was earlier last month (September 2023). The convention model for this set was of the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue, Washington. This is the location where the convention moved in 2023 after being elsewhere for a long time. The set contains 492 pieces and was exclusive to the convention so unless you find someone selling it on the secondary market somewhere, you won’t be able to pick it up anytime soon. You could source the majority of the pieces with the exception of the custom printed BrickCon tile.

The top of the box has a picture of the set and the set name. The bottom of the box has the BrickCon logo. I included a picture of the side of the box as I received set number 82 of only 250 produced. How about that for rare?

The set contains a Ziploc bag of parts. BrickCon sources it’s parts through the LUG Bulk program via LEGO and then volunteers sort through it all. So while it’s not the professional looking sealed bag, it works for this set. Of note, the volunteers missed putting in two of the 2x2 blue plates needed for the set. Thankfully, I had some on hand so I was able to complete the build as described in the instructions.

Here’s the final build. It looks to be a similar scale to the Architecture theme. Maybe? The front captures some of the key building details quite well. They also got the sidewalks and roads pretty accurate. The printed tile is a nice addition to replicate the electronic billboard out front. Why the odd seams you ask? Let’s move on…

If you didn’t notice from the last picture, there are some red plates and tiles sticking out the back of the building. These parts can be pushed in through a slot in the back of the building. This then pushes out a small 3D representation of the BrickCon logo via some Technic pieces. This also pushes open the front of the building which is connected with hinge pieces so it opens up. This is a pretty clever design and something that was not mentioned when the set was released so a fun surprise after building it.

It was actually a challenging build. The instructions are designed to save space and so there are a lot of steps crammed onto each page. I missed a few parts early on and have to tear it apart to get it just right so the mechanism would work.

Great job BrickCon team! I look forward to attending next year and building another convention model.

Happy building!

BrickCon 2023 - Attending Virtually Was Awesome

I attended BrickCon virtually from 7 through 10 September 2023 and had a blast as a third time attendee. This year I applied for, interviewed, and was selected to be a part of the virtual staff. In the past, I have done posts about all the activities I participated in. This year, my focus was more on making sure everything went smoothly in virtual land so I don’t have too much to post about specific presentations. I do have a bunch to share though.

Con Printed Program

This year’s theme was “Journeys” as the convention moved from it’s prior location in of many years in WA to the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue, WA. I had never been to the previous location, but we got a virtual tour of the new location and it looked like a great facility. The wifi there was better too which helped for Zoom connections.

Virtually we started with to tour of the facility, we got to see MOCs being set up, and we got an insider look at the Swag bags and convention model.

As mentioned, I didn’t participate in a ton of presentations, but I did get to participate in a number of the games. We had a 150 piece free build to a theme (pick any 150 pieces in your collection and build to the theme in 1 hour). We also had attendees go out and get set #31135-1: Vintage Motorcycle. We did a number of games with this set to include a speed build of an alternate set found on rebrickable.com, a sock build of one of the models, a sock unbuild of the main model, an alternate build with your own background using any parts in 45 minutes, and finally the free build with your own collection of parts to a theme within 1.5 hours. They were a lot of fun to host and watch and I think the participants enjoyed themselves. We had a lot of talented and creative builders.

One new thing we did this year was hold a Virtual AFOL Spotlight. This was an opportunity to either share pictures or take your web camera and show some builds you were working on or sets you had on display. A bunch of us had a great time chatting and showing off bricks. Hopefully we can continue this event into the future.

Screen shot of Robein Sather’s opening slide from his keynote presentation

This year, the keynote speaker was Robin Sather. He is a LEGO Certified Professional from Canada and a super talented builder. He brought a bunch of large scale Duplo builds to the convention (and there are some videos out there of him crashing it after the show ended). His presentation went though the history of AFOLs, his building history, and his involvement in LEGO Masters New Zealand. Below is a picture of one of his Duplo builds from his presentation. Overall, his talk was great and well received by the virtual attendees.

Picture of a build by Robin Sather from his BrickCon 2023 presentation.

One of the highlights I always enjoy is the swag and merch from BrickCon. Here’s a quick rundown of everything I ordered.

Here’s the convention t-shirt. I thought the logo was great. I like the sea monster in there.

---

There was another string back pack this year to carry all of the swag. The biggest item was a notebook with a pen and some sticky notes inside. It says it’s for travel plans to conventions and to put down ideas for future MOCs.

---

This year included two stickers. One from the Brothers Brick and the other being the BrickCon logo.

Also included was a lanyard from Bricks and Minifigs and then a retractable brick separator clip which was awesome.

---

We got a few items from vendors to include a pack from Brick Warriors with some custom minifigure hair pieces, some printed bricks from the Brick Chick, and some custom capes/aprons from Cape Madness.

---

Similar to last year, we got a buildable BrickCon logo. Then we got some parts for trading. At the convention attendees can swap parts. As a virtual attendee, you just keep them all unless you have friends to trade with.

---

Lastly, there was a small build of a minifigure scale moving dolly, a bunch of printed parts from various sets, a custom printed tile with the BrickCon ‘23 logo, another BrickCon custom printed part for a box to carry with the dolly, and then my printed bricks that I ordered.

I also purchased the BrickCon convention model, but I’ll do a separate review on that one another time.

Sorry, not a detailed post for this year. I highly recommend you attend next year. It was only $25 to register for the virtual session so it’s pretty affordable. Hopefully the price remains the same next year. You can follow updates for 2024 and sign up for the mailing list here. I hope to see you in virtual attendance in 2024!
Happy building!

Registration is Now Open for BrickCon 2023

Registration is now open for BrickCon 2023! The dates are 7 through 10 September 2023 for the AFOL convention and public days are 9 and 10 September. You can go register here. Tickets for the in-person AFOL convention are $85 until 24 August and then they go to $100. The virtual convention will be $25 regardless of when you purchase your ricket.

The convention will be at the Meydenbaur Center in Bellevue, WA this year which is a change from previous years, but it sounds like it should be a great event despite the new location. You can learn more about BrickCon here. There will be a public convention as well, but those tickets aren’t available yet so check back for when they start.

I plan to attend virtually again this year. Will you be there?

A Place Where Minifigures Can Go to Drink Adult Beverages

Or maybe this post title should have been: Set Review - BrickCon 2022 - Convention Model - The Wooden Duck

If you scroll back in the blog a bit, you can see my posts about attending BrickCon 2022 virtually. As a virtual attendee, I was able to order SWAG and a convention model just like they physical attendees. My order arrived quickly after the event was over. You can see more on the SWAG here.

I ordered the convention model from 2020 as well and you can see that review here.

“The Wooden Duck” was the name of this model and it contains 346 pieces. You can see my write up about a talk Chris Malloy did at BrickCon 2022 here. I tried to summarize the process he went through without typing it out word for word. I don’t remember how much I paid for the model. Maybe $30? I thought the cost was reasonable and BrickCon mentioned that they don’t make a profit on the model. It’s assembled by volunteers and they just pass along the cost to us.

The box has a distinct look to it with a design also made by Chris of the model. The front also has the BrickCon logo and the number of pieces. The back has the BrickCon logo and the year. My box got crushed during shipping and the seal came undone. Not a big deal for me as I intended to build it and not keep it sealed or sell it.

One side of the box has Chris’s name on it. Another had a hand written number stating that I purchased #184 of 250 total models. I’m not sure I've ever owned such a rare product.

The contents were a plastic bag with parts in it and then the instruction booklet. BrickCon used the LUGBulk program to source the parts and then the volunteers went through and helped to put the parts in each bag. The instructions are printed which is nice, but there are a lot of steps crammed into each section. BrickCon assumes the buyers of these models are AFOLs who build regularly so this won’t be a big deal. It probably wouldn’t be great for kids or newer builders.

The set comes with one minifigure who is a bartender. He has a glass and what has been used as a cast, but is being used as a cloth. His face has two prints. The side I took the picture of and then a laughing face. I like the torso with the suspenders and tie.

The set comes with 3 printed tiles. One is an art piece from #10297-1: Boutique Hotel. One is a mirror from… um… I’m not sure. Then the last one is a custom tile, unique to this set. It has the infamous wooden duck, a reference to the 90th anniversary of LEGO and its start in 1932, and finally the number 21 in reference to the 21st BrickCon.

Onto the final build… this design is jam packed with a ton of details considering the size and piece count. Plus, it was designed knowing a lot of great pieces would be used for AFOLs who want to take it apart for MOCs. The brick red color along with the sand green pieces are two colors that aren’t super popular and they’re great to see. The various items used as bottles are very creative and it really looks like how you’d picture a bar. The balls used as lights hanging on the top are all glow in the dark pieces which is cool and one of the bottles glows in the dark too.

Chris threw in a squirrel. I’m guessing it was so you had another opportunity to get a squirrel. I’m not sure why there would be one at the bar. Maybe it’s eating the pretzel?

Overall, it’s a great build. I like the piece usage and the cost was very reasonable considering what you get. There is some play functionality in that you can add more minifigures or add the bar to another scene. If I attend BrickCon again, I hope to have the ability to get the convention model. Nice job Chris!

BrickCon (Virtual) 2022 - Day 4

The last day of BrickCon!

First, I tuned into a Q&A session with Steven Walker about BrickCon and future events. Next year, the physical convention is moving to Bellevue, WA for the first time in 21+ years so there were a lot of questions about that. On the virtual side, they said they will keep it going as long as they can get at least 50 people to attend and they’d like to virtual side to go on 24 hours a day if possible during the convention as they know there are folks in different time zones. Maybe someday, I’ll make it to BrickCon in person.

Next up I attended the BrickCon Commerative Model Q&A with Chris Malloy. Chris has been designing the BrickCon models since 2017-ish. He lost count on the number he’s done in total. Chris went through the design process, challenges with parts, creating the box, designing the instructions, and getting the parts.

Here’s his slide where he introduced himself.

Here’s the final model design. Chris said designing the model was pretty easy. The challenges came in the rest of the process.

Chris mentioned challenges he had with new pieces not being in Stud.io, trying to make sure all the parts could be sourced using the LUGBulk program, and then some issues with printed pieces as seen in some of the examples below.

Here’s the copy of the box. Chris showed how he did a pencil sketch, colored it in, and then it became the box.

The custom tile is original to this set only. The left side shows some of the draft versions before the center one became the final version.

Chris mentioned that he had to add a lot of pieces during each step in the instructions to keep the instructions to a specific page count. This kept the price lower. They considered digital instructions, but decided the better option was to go with printed ones so people could build them at the convention and they wouldn’t have to worry about keeping the instructions active online for years to come.

Great presentation and great model Chris! Thanks to you and the BrickCon team for putting this together. I can’t wait for my set to arrive.

Next up was Stuart Harris from the LEGO® House again. He talked about how they go about developing the exclusive models sold at the brand store in the LEGO® House. Here are the last 3 sets.

Here are some concept models of #40501-1: Wooden Duck. Stuart built the concept models and then turned them over to another designer for the final production model. He also showed how they advertised the set within the LEGO® House.

One interesting note, Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen is the one who approves the sets and Stuart said that while he’s honored that Kjeld is the one to approve, it is pretty nerve wracking to bring a set to his office.

Here is #40502-1: The Brick Moulding Machine. It started off as an idea to make the moulds, but then turned into the machine that you can see in the LEGO® House today.

Next, Stuart talked about #40503-1: Dagny Holm - Master Builder. He talked about Dagny, getting the set built, and choosing what they would go with in a final set.

Stuart talked about the models they design for the LEGO Insider Tour as well, but the more popular discussion was this 3D printed duck below. Here’s an article from Bricket.com on the duck. This was recently released at the AFOL Fan Media Day as well as at Skærbæk Fan Weekend (I think). There were a lot of questions on this duck and a ton of interest. Stuart had one on hand to show off. He mentioned that it may return in a wider offering sometime in the future so we’ll see what happens.

The last presentation I participated in was by Becky Gorlin. She is a middle school level educator and LEGO Robotics Instructor at Granite Falls School District in Washington (about a 50 minute drive from Seattle and the convention area). I sadly didn’t catch the whole thing, but it sounded very interesting and it was cool to see how she uses LEGO in all aspects of education. I’m hoping they post this one online later.

Lastly, the closing ceremony. There were words of thanks, some admin notes, info on future conventions, lots of prizes, and then awards. I didn’t capture all of the awards, but here are the honorable mentions and winner of the Best in Show awards.

First, the 2 honorable mentions. These winners got a copy of #10497-1: Galaxy Explorer. Not sure how the group is going to share the set, but great build!

And the winner got a copy of #10305-1: Lion Knights Castle.

Nice work MOC builders!

It was a great convention, even if I did attend virtually. Thanks to those who worked hard to put it on and safe travels to everyone on their way home.

I will post more once my swag and the convention model arrive.

In the meantime, happy building!

BrickCon (Virtual) 2022 - Day 3

Back for more fun!

We started the day watching a tour of the convention floor before the public was allowed in. It was quick but great to see everything. I hope it gets posted online so I can go through it again and hit pause to look at things.

The first presentation I attended was by LEGO® House employee Stuart Harris. I have heard presentations by Stuart before and am familiar with the LEGO® House based on my 2019 visit there. I tuned in to get an update on some of the changes which was good. Beyond that, a lot of it was a repeat, but that was okay. Stuart was in person at the convention so that was a nice change versus having a lot of the LEGO® employees online.

The next event I attended was titled “Building Feedback: Peer Review in the LEGO Community” and it was presented by Kyle Keller who also writes for the Brothers Brick. Initially, I thought it was a bit ridiculous. Have we lost the ability to communicate with each other without hurting feelings or being rude? I would think this should be obvious, but I need to step out of my box and understand that the world is different. It was probably a good thing for people to realize that they can’t hide behind their online firewalls and need to give good constructive feedback. Kyle gave some lessons and then did practice with some pictures of old builds that he had. Props to Kyle for handling a challenging topic.

The last presentation I attended was by Deb Banerji titled “Lego Mosaics: Algorithms, Software, and Other Fun Stuff.” Deb built an open source program to take pictures and turn them into mosaics out of LEGO parts. He explained how he optimized the program, some challenges still involved, and a lot of other higher math that was above my brain. Very interesting though. The link to his site is below or you can find it here.

The awards ceremony was on day 3, but it was a bit late for me. I hope the best folks won!

BrickCon (Virtual) 2022 - Day 2

Day 2 was another great day. I started off by attending a few presentations. The first one was “The Lego News Room: Working at the Speed of Social Media.” This was about how LEGO in the US handles social media, carries on conversations across multiple channels, and keeps up with real time popular items. I’m not great at social media by any means so this was eye opening to me and it was interesting to hear what they had to say.

The next presentation I joined in on was “New Element Design from a Mechanical Engineering Perspective.” Two engineers from LEGO in Billund, Denmark talked about some of the parts they’ve designed, some of the challenges they’ve encountered, and what their experiences are working on the team.

Here are a few copies of slides they presented with examples of some parts the presenters worked on. They did specific parts, not the full minifigues.

They also showed us some of the software they use to make changes to parts. The picture below is an example of a part that they walked us through to talk about how they adjusted a part to improve its quality.

The next session I joined was an Ask Me Anything session with Jordan Paxton of the AFOL Engagement Team. Jordan helps run the LEGO® Ambassador Network (LAN) and while I have been a part of conversations with the LAN and AFOL Engagement Team in the past, this one was very heated and emotional. I was actually quite shocked how passionate people were. I’m not 100% certain on what is going on, but I guess a few LEGO User Groups (LUGs) were removed from the LAN and with that, they lost access to support from the LEGO Group and discount parts.

Two notes I did take were that we shouldn’t expect to see new set reveals at conventions and the brittle brown bricks issue has been solved, but LEGO has done a poor job advertising it. I guess the brown parts were stored at the top of the warehouse (warmest) and there was a color change issue that took place. Since then, they have added fans to warehouse and the issue has been fixed. What are you all seeing with your newer brown pieces?

The last thing I participated in was the Keynote presentation which was given by Angus MacLane. He is probably best known as a Director with Pixar, but is also an AFOL. I didn’t know it, but he was the fan designer behind set #21303-1: WALL-E. He stated that he was in the perfect position for the build as he was a part of the movie team so he knew about WALL-E well in advance and could start working on a LEGO version. Also, he was the one to approve the IP for Pixar so the LEGO designers had to work with him on any changes they made.

His introduction was given by someone in a Buzz Lightyear costume which was awesome!

He bragged that in making the Lightyear movie, he made sure the ship had a yellow windscreen to make sure that LEGO produced another yellow windscreen part. I don’t know how true that is, but I’m not sure I care. Glad the piece is out there now.

His talk was awesome, well put together, and very relatable for LEGO fans. As someone mentioned, this session was well worth the $25 registration fee to sign up. I actually think it may end up on YouTube in the near future. If it does, I’ll add a link.

The main purpose of the talk was to present how he goes about building MOCs. He uses the SUCCS method (defined below) and he went through various examples of builds he’s done and how he used this method. I don’t think I could do the talk justice here so just stay tuned for the video.

Onto day 3! Happy building!

How I Got an Orange Classic Space Minifigure

I attended BrickCon 2020 virtually back in early October 2020 and finally got to building the convention model (I was building something else). You can see my other posts here and here. If you look at the post about SWAG you can see all of the stuff I got (for a fee). The set came in this small box with a printed sticker on it. The sticker has the Convention logo and some views of the set.

One of the big highlights is the minifigure in the set. It’s an orange classic space minifigure. If you’re reading this after 2020, this was the year the orange spaceman joined the crew which could be found in the LEGO Minifigure: A Visual History. Instead of buying the book to get the minifigure, I got this set. The difference is the minifigure cranium. The one from the book is the classic yellow with two dots for eyes and the single line smile. The one in the BrickCon set is a female with some eyebrows and lipstick. Anyways, this adds to the other recent additions to include the ones found in #70841-1: Benny’s Space Squad (2019) and then the LEGO Ideas #21109-1: Exo Suit from 2014.

Since it’s not an official set, it comes with some instructions and a standard plastic bag filled to the brim with parts. No piece separator here and the instructions don’t have anything about the designer. By the way, the designer was Chris Malloy. He’s the managing editor of The Brother’s Brick and designed a great set. His page is here.

Here’s the completed set. There are four 8x8 stud plates. Each one is connected to the others with Technic pins. It is designed so that you can add additional plates to the set as well. From left to right, you start with the the ladder from the space ship that the spacewoman climbed down. Then the next one is part of a castle wall with a deceased guard next to his spear and flag. There are a few pumpkin like plants with some leaves growing out of them. The final plate has part of a façade that has fallen over. There are some plants growing on them and the paint is wearing off (from white to gray).

Unlike official LEGO sets, there are some connections that wouldn’t fly. They are a bit flimsy and you have to be pretty delicate when assembling everything.

Also, the parts selection is pretty impressive. Besides the orange spacewoman, there are some less common parts. The pumpkins, the plants, the yellow and black branches, a silver curved tile, and a few others. Even if you don’t like the model, there are plenty of parts for other sets.

Did you attend Virtual BrickCon 2020 and did you get the set? Did you like it?

Happy building!

BrickCon 2020 - My Experience

I posted about some of the swag I received and a bit on BrickCon 2020 here. This post will focus on the content. I attended a Brickworld Virtual back in May 2020 and that was a number of online rooms that yoiu could go into and out of at will. There were a few presentations throughout the day as well. BrickCon was a lot more than that. They had multiple sessions scheduled every hour, a Discord server running full time, Zoom rooms to hang out in, and lots of prizes throughout. All of the MOCs on display were on a private Flickr group page for viewing. While I would have preferred the opportunity to go in person, meet people, ask questions of MOC builders, and not be stuck behind my computer, the experience was definitely worth it in a COVID-19 context. Here’s a run through of some of the events I attended.

Tiago Catarino is a former LEGO Designer turned YouTuber from Portugal. You can visit his YouTube channel here. Now he posts small builds that you can do yourself with minimal pieces. He also has a few videos on what it was like to work at LEGO and why he quit (spoiler alert… it was not because he hated LEGO). Tiago had two sessions. The first was a Q&A for registered AFOLs only where he gave a short presentation and then people could ask him questions. The second was a build with Tiago session open to the public. I attended the registered AFOL session. Tiago shared some great info about working at LEGO, being a YouTuber, and some of his other experiences. Here’s a screen shot of him below.

The next one I attended was a public session where Stuart Harris presented to the public. If you don’t know him, he’s the lead designer for the LEGO House®. Stuart gave a presentation about how the LEGO House® was developed and built. Then he gave a description of each of the zones and what you can do there. Below are a few pictures from the presentation that I grabbed. The first is one of Stuart’s creations/Stuart working at the LEGO House®. The second is a brick built model of the Minifig Cafe.

Another one I attended was with registered AFOLs only and was a presentation by Gaute Munch (Lego Product Technology Director) and Flemming Jepsen (from the Powered Up team) on Powered UP. I am not an expert in this area by any means so a lot of the conversation was a bit over my cranium, but it was interesting to here. My experience has been motorizing the Crocodile Locomotive, but there is a lot that LEGO has in the works. Just after BrickCon, LEGO released a new version of the app which allows customization. They are working on a rechargeable battery box, new software, and a bunch more. Gaute and Flemming took some tough questions from the audience and handled them very well. I’m glad I participated in this one. The screen shot below is one of the slides with Gaute presenting.

Another event was a keynote where Andrew Becraft (The Brothers Brick Founder and Editor-in-Chief) interviewed Skip Kodak (Executive Vice President, Americas Market Group - LEGO). This was an interesting conversation covering a range of topics from sustainability to COVID-19 impacts for the company, to the adult focused products and lines. I’m glad I attended this one and thought it was great that LEGO offered up someone from upper management to participate.

Throughout the event, a number of AFOLs got on to share their MOCs. One of them was with Ben Smith who lives in the UK. He builds in the space theme and has some pretty impressive MOCs. You can see what he builds on his Flickr page. The screen shot below shows a classic space set, but he had a modern take on it and some other larger space crafts to show off. The benefits of having a virtual event is to get folks to participate in other countries to include people like Ben (and me!).

LEGO Designer Chris McVeigh gave a presentation and Q&A. If you aren’t familiar with Chris and his work, he designed the Brick Sketches™ and the latest Winter Village set the #10275-1: Elf Clubhouse. Chris shared his AFOL experience, how he was hired by LEGO, and then some details on designing the Winter Village set.

I sadly did not get to see this full presentation, but Graham Hancock gave a presentation on LEGO’s foray into catering to adult fans. If you’re not familiar with Graham, he run Brick Fanatics and is the deputy editor for Blocks Magazine. The part of the presentation I saw had details on the history of sets focused for adults. Some I remember and some I hadn’t heard of. And of course some that I wish I had.

I also attended a presentation and Q&A with Henrik Andersen. Henrik is a LEGO Designer who might be best known for his recent work on #75252-1: Imperial Star Destroyer. He’s been with the company for a while and showed some of the other sets he worked on an parts he developed. He went through the details of how they develop parts and showed what works and what doesn’t work. Most notably (for me anyway) I learned he was the developer of the cheese slope.

One last presentation I attended was with George Patelis. George lives in Greece and goes by PatGeo313 on his YouTube channel and Flickr gallery. He made a short video on some of his latest MOCs on YouTube here. Definitely check his work out as he has some impressive stuff.

That was a quick glimpse into my BrickCon 2020 experience. I had a lot of fun even if it wasn’t in person. I hope I can attend again next year and maybe some day get there in person.

Until then, happy building!

BrickCon 2020 - Intro and SWAG

I attended BrickWorld Virtual in May of 2020 and when I saw that BrickCon was also virtual this year (2-4 October), I had to sign up. If you’ve never head of it, BrickCon is normally a Seattle based convention. Based on a search online, it has been going on since around 2002 and is usually the first weekend of October. Hopefully someone can correct me if I’m wrong.

The convention was in the Pacific Coast of the US time zone so being 9 hours different didn’t help much as I would miss a bunch of the late night/early morning happenings. I did however sign up to be a “trusted virtual guide.” I don’t know how trusted I can be with leading people around virtual conventions, but it gave me a chance to help out and meet some new people. I’ll go into the convention in a separate post. For now I want to talk about the swag.

To attend as an AFOL you had to pay a bit more than the $5 the public paid, but they had various levels ranging from $25 to $90. I went for the biggest package being that it was my first BrickCon and I wanted to see what it was all about. So here’s what I got…

Tee-Shirts!

The first one is the Convention shirt and was designed by Kevin Hinkle. I definitely had my phone and computer on so that accurately reflects me(no tablet though). The next one is my TVG shirt to designate that I was one while on screen. I didn’t have the background set up for Zoom and you really couldn’t see the shirt, but that’s okay.

Also included were a few printed bricks. You had the option to get some custom ones so I got one that had my blog name. It also came with the yellow BrickCon 2020 brick. Finally, it had the white one which on the back says it is a recognized AFOL Networking Event. I stacked that on top of my BrickWorld brick so I can say I have attended two.

Still more swag… Next up was a baby minifig with the BrickCon logo on its shirt. Super awesome! Also, there was a 2x4 tan tile with the logo for this convention to include the date. Note the blue plate behind them is just from my collection to take the picture. It didn’t come with the swag pack.

Additionally, there was this fun pin with the logo. I’m not sure of the reason for the split up. Is it supposed to be like the shape of the LEGO House®?

I have not been to a physical convention yet, but apparently BrickCon hands out bags of parts for you to trade with other attendees. They did the same this year and you could then set up trade with people who live near you or I guess mail them to each other. I got six different parts and thankfully they are not standard bricks or plates. There’s a printed window panel, a tile with studs on the bottom, a larger window frame, a round 2x2 with an odd bottom (not sure what to call the light greenish one), a gold colored slope, and then a light gray 1x1 roof type slope. I’ll have to figure out how to build with these, but since I had never seen most of them, I’m pleased with what I was sent.

Lastly is the Con model. This one was designed by Chris Molloy. He’s the managing editor for the Brother’s Brick and a LEGO Ambassador. I have not built the set yet, but will and will post a review. The model is in a post disaster type world with a space minifigure exploring the ruins. The space minifigure comes in a rare orange color in the classic space theme. There are a few other cool pieces included. I look forward to digging into it.

Okay, that’s the cool swag. Are you drooling yet? I was super excited to get the container in the mail.

I’ll post later on some of the events I attended.

Happy building!