The LEGO Company Steps into the COVID-19 Fight

I first saw it on the Brick Fan web site, but it appeared first on LEGO’s Facebook page. LEGO is using some of it’s equipment to build protective visors for medical teams. The video is on the Facebook page as well as on the Brick Fan site here. It’s even made some of the mainstream media like in the USA Today here. While there’s been a lot of different companies stepping up to help during the pandemic, it’s great to see one of my favorite brands get into the action. Thank you LEGO!

No bricks in these containers!

Celebrities Building with LEGO Bricks while Physically Distancing

If you’re reading this in April of 2020, you’re well aware of the COVID-19 pandemic impacting the world. I won’t beat the deceased Thoroughbred talking about it as I’m sure you are sick of the media reports about it, but it has been fun to see how LEGO has popped up through it all.

One side note… my work has been using the term “physically distancing,” We need to stay apart physically so we don’t spread disease, but socially we need to remain connected to get through this together.

From 18 March 2020, there was Conan O’Brien who posted the picture below on Twitter (direct link). It looks like they were building #42110-1: LEGO Technic Land Rover Defender.

And then Daniel Radcliffe was interviewed by Stephen Colbert on “The Late Show” and he mentioned building #75936-1: T. Rex Rampage over three days with his girlfriend. Not bad for a guy who has characters who appear in LEGO sets. The clip is below, but you can advance to around the 7.55 mark if you want to hear the LEGO discussion.

That’s it for now. Have you seen any others? Send them to me at store@bricksforbricks.com or post them in the comments and I’ll do another post.

Are you building anything while at home? I’m working on #10270-1: Bookshop. Haven’t finished it yet, but I’ll get a review out when I’m done.

Happy building and stay healthy!

Set Review - #40370-1: Steam Engine

I wrote about the 40 Year Anniversary train set released in March 2020 as a gift with purchase back in this post. My set arrived and I had a chance to put it together. Here’s my review. The set contains 188 pieces and 1 minifigure. It is no longer available from LEGO so time to find it on the secondary market if you missed it (sorry).

If you want an in depth review from some LEGO train experts, check out the Brick Model Railroader’s review at this link. They go way more in depth into the model that I ever could. I will just give you my opinions.

Here’s the box. It’s nothing too special other than it does have the old logo on the bottom right of both sides.

The contents are 3 parts bags, a sticker sheet, and 4 large pieces to include 2 red 2x16 plates and 2 light gray 6x10 plates. The instruction booklet focuses on the build only and doesn’t have any fun details about the anniversary or the history of LEGO trains. It’s a gift with purchase set so I guess they can’t put too much into it. While I am not a fan of stickers, I do like the metallic look of these stickers. The silver color goes well on the set. Especially the 40 year sticker.

The build isn’t broken down in the instructions or by bag so I picked a few logical points. You start with the minifigure dressed in the old outfit with 2 dots for eyes and a line for a face. You also build the base of the set which is very similar to the Architecture line of sets only you have to apply the sticker for the set name versus having a printed tile. You also attach the 40 years sticker here.

Next is the base of the train. I can’t remember the last time a set came with 2x10 bricks. The base is pretty simple only it includes some Technic pieces which I’m pretty sure were not included in the original set.

And then the final thing. It is mostly studs on top and is a pretty simple build. There is no magnetic buffer so you’ll either have to use one or create one if you plan to hook this up to a train. The buffers are a fun design and something I’d consider using on a MOC in the future if necessary.

So If you look at my front and back view pictures, you realize that I need to space the wheels out a bit more so the engine can fit on the stand. Otherwise, you get a crooked display like I have. Whoops.

Overall, it’s not a bad set. As a train fan, I like it as it goes back to the original days of trains, but it has a few of the modern upgrades. I would have preferred for it to be displayed on a track, but I’m sure that didn’t happen due to cost and the goal to keep this set small and cheap to produce.

If you want to get this set, sadly you’ll have to get it on the secondary market and I’m sure it’s going for quite a bit by now. There’s no telling if LEGO will offer it again or not.

As to whether this is a sign of things to come at LEGO, it’s hard to say. I doubt the train theme will pick up with any force beyond what is out there. Would I love to see a Creator Expert style train line again, you bet? I’m not keeping my hopes up though.

What are your thoughts? Is this a sign of changes at LEGO? Or just a fun set to remember an anniversary?

Happy building!

Set Review - #80105-1: Chinese New Year Temple Fair

I’m excited LEGO has continued with this special edition theme of sets related to Chinese culture. This is the third one. The first was #80103-1: Dragon Boat Race and the second was #80104-1: Lion Dance. #80105-1: Chinese New Year Temple Fair was released on 15 January 2020 in the US. It contains 1,664 pieces and 14 minifgures. It costs $119.99 in the US which works out to be $0.072 per piece. I found it locally for around $99. Be on the lookout for discounts in your area if you can find them. It’s priced well already, but a $20 discount is even better.

Onto the review…

The box is bright red and picks up the theme with fireworks, a rat for the “Year of the Rat,” a depiction of the set, and then showing all of the minifigures. The back shows the various play features.

The set contains 10 parts bags. They are labeled one through nine with two bags labeled numbered one. There are three instruction booklets that are packaged and in good shape. Most importantly there are no stickers! WOOHOO!

The first two bags include a tree with some decorations to include some banners and a lantern. The tree is a simple build, yet it still fits in well to the overall design.

It also includes the first stand for the fair. This stand is a food stand with some cooking food on a stick, some cookie type items, some chicken legs, and some fun cake type items with faces. There is a red flower bouquet attached to the stand as well. There is a small cooking area with some extra supplies, a knife, and space for the minifigure to work. My favorite part of the stand is the roof. I like how the designers were able to replicate the look of Chinese architecture and that each stand was done in a slightly different way to make a similar styled effect.

This bag includes the first two minifigures to include a stand vendor/cook and then a happy festival attendee.

The second bag includes another stand. This one is a toy stand with a lot of fun details. There are some lollipop looking items, some balloons, and then various toys to include a small airplane, a panda bear, a duck, a rabbit, and a rat.

I included this stand in a picture with the stand from the first set of bags as they are connected by a string with lights, lanterns, and banners.

Additionally, you get two more minifigures. One is a vendor and the other is another male minifigure attending the festival.

The third bag starts the temple build. It begins with the base. I like the base as it includes a great flower design with the 1x1 flower piece and some greenery for leaves in the front. The stairs are a simple yet useful design as they added in studs for minifigures to be fixed to and they added in some design other than increasing the number of plates to climb up. I’m also a fan of the greenish colored pieces under the light gray arches. I’m not sure what they are called, but I like the effect it achieves.

This bag includes a boy minifigure. He has a red scarf and his holding a… um… I’m not sure what it is. Anyone know?

The fourth bag starts the structure of the temple gate. The build is fairly simple, yet full of detail. You can see initially some of the printed tiles that add to the design. Along with the lanterns and the gold colored pieces, it really stands out. The pieces on either side of the door are the brown 2x2x2 “box” pieces used in other sets stacked on top of each other. It’s a great technique to get some texture versus using plain bricks.

This bag includes a female minifigure with a small purse.

The fifth bag starts part of the roof of the temple entrance. The color scheme really pops with the yellow, orange-yellow, gold, and red. I like how it sticks with the Asian roof theme used elsewhere.

You get a girl minifigure with a scarf and holding a lai see or red envelope typically given as a gift with money in it.

Bag six adds part of the roof section with more printed pieces with Chinese calligraphy.

You also get a male minifigure holding a baby bottle (a hint of what is to come).

The seventh bag finishes off the temple with the second layer roof. It is built in the same manner as the first layer and looks equally impressive. My only complaint is that it is just this gate and not an entire building. Perhaps that would be a future challenge… building the full structure.

One note in building the roof slopes is to make sure the orange 1x1… um… I’m not sure what the new pieces are called. “U’s” or tunnel looking pieces? Whatever they are called, you just have to make sure they are in line. If they are not all straight, the build doesn’t look as good. I had to adjust a few as the angle I put them on were slightly off. Not a big deal, just something to pay attention to when building.

The last bag had a male minifigure with a baby bottle. This one has the female minifigure, the baby, and a stroller. The female minifigure has a fun hat on over her hair which is new (I think). The stroller is fine although a bit big. The parents have to put their arms up in order to push the stroller. I may have to look into adjusting this later on.

The eighth bag come with another stand and another tree. The tree is very similar to the last tree. The stand sells some pottery type items and some microfigures in various colors. The set comes with a bunch of extra microfigures too which is a nice bonus.

You get two more minifigures in this bag. An older adult female and then a younger one.

The ninth bag assembles the last stand which is a shadow puppet theater. The highlight of this build is the cool shadow theater pane that is printed and not a sticker. It goes along with the rest of the set which doesn’t have stickers. Yay for the amazing number of printed pieces! This bag also assembles some fire crackers, and some gifts to sell or give away.

You get two more minifigures. An older male to run the puppet show with his microfigures and dragon for the show and then a boy with a lai see envelope. The boy has a fun winter hat which I don’t recall ever seeing before.

The final part of this build is another strand of lights with Chinese lanterns and a banner to connect the stand from bag eight and this bag.

So that does it. Here’s a picture of the full set. It’s not a great angle, but you can see everything you get. There is a lot going on in this set which definitely helps to justify the price. Besides the great price per piece, you get 14 minifigures, the temple entrance area, two trees, and the four stands. To encourage you to spend money, this one goes well with the other two Chinese themed sets. You could easily make a larger themed “China Town” or festival area. I’m thankful to have found this one at $20 off, but probably would have paid full price had I not seen the sale.

Finally, a few pictures a little closer and at different angles. LEGO has said they’ll keep these around for six months or so. We’ll see how long they stay on shelves, but don’t wait too long to buy if you are interested. As of the writing of this post, LEGO is running double VIP points so it might be a good opportunity to scoop this up (along with a few freebies).

I was very positive on this set. What am I missing on the negative side?

Happy building!

Germany's Wiblingen Monastery - In Brick Form

I recently was able to stop at the Wiblingen Monastery in Ulm-Wiblingen, Germany. It’s about halfway between the cities of Stuttgart and Munich. According to Google, it’s a “Baroque Benedictine monastery, founded in 1093 & expanded in 1714, featuring a rococo library.” We stopped in and saw the cool library and toured the museum. Unexpectedly, we ventured into one of the rooms and saw some LEGO bricks. WOOHOO!!! And here’s what we saw…

Here’s a picture of the actual building. One of the first things you notice is the two towers in the brick version that aren’t in the actual building. The brick builders decided to add on the towers that were never completed in their version. Other than that, it looks like they were pretty accurate in building their version.

Source: https://www.kloster-wiblingen.de/en/home#impression-images-22

So the details (based on a fact sheet placed near the build in English and a few other languages)…
-Built by Burkhard Siemoneit and Stephan Schumann
-It took ~2 years to build (mostly weekend time)
-It contains over 800,00 bricks
-It weighs around 350 kg or over 770 lbs
-It is 3.5 m (11.48 ft) long by 2.6 m (8.53 ft) wide
-The towers are 1.8 m (5.91 ft) high
-It was estimated to cost over 40,000€ or ~$43,600
-The build was finished on 20 July 2017

Here is a scaled down version of the build.

I’ve included a number of pictures for a few reasons. First, you can get some closer views of the details of the build. Second, you can see some of the fun Easter Eggs they threw into the build.

A wedding being held outside

A minifigure walking on the roof, Superman and Superwoman.

Batman climbing up (or down) the side of the tower

A few minifigure “statues”

Some storks on the roof and if you look closely, some burglars in the background on the roof.

Bart Simpson on the roof of the tower.

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Nearby to the monastery was a giant festival scene. It was chuck full of details with food trucks, a band, bakers making a cake, and a bunch of vendors. I included just a few pictures for your viewing pleasure.

As an American, I think we need to have more giant displays at random locations like I have seen in Europe. I’m a huge fan of seeing these displays and I can’t wait to see more. If you know of any I should check out, let me know. In the meantime, happy building!

The Best Quarantine Activity - Building with LEGO Bricks

I don’t really follow professional sports anymore, but I enjoy seeing when a big time sports player decides to pick up some bricks. Recently, a player for the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers posted some videos of himself on TikTok. A reporter caught it and it’s making the rounds on the web. I found an article here on yahoo.com. If you scroll down a bit, you’ll find LEGO Speed Champions set #75895-1: Porsche 911 Turbo 3.0 and NBA player temporarily joining the LEGO fan media with a speed build of the set.

Not sure if it’s just a one time deal for self promotion or if we have a fellow AFOL on our hands, but glad to see it. Keep building sir!

40 Years of LEGO Trains

This is not new to the community, but #40370: Steam Train is a gift with purchases of over $99 (in the US) between 1 and 15 March (assuming there is still stock available). LEGO does not send me a free copy for review, but as a big train fan, I bit the bullet and purchased something I was holding back on to get a copy. It’s exciting to have a train released again, but is this a sign of things to come or just a way to get nostalgic AFOLs like me to spend more money?

I will post a review once I get the set, but overall just from seeing the picture I’m a big fan. I like the old school minifigure a lot and look forward to adding it to my collection. The set itself is also cool looking and I can’t wait to build it.

I hope this is a sign of more to come in 2020!

Highlighting a Professional Builder

There are some amazing builders out there, but there are not a lot of them that have their own businesses and teams to build various creations to go on display around the world. Sean Kenney is one of them. He’s a former LEGO Certified Professional who now works on his own. You can check out his site here for more details.

Recently, the team of Beyond the Brick and Zusammengebaut had the opportunity to tour Sean’s studio in Brooklyn, NY. The video is posted below. It’s just under an hour long, but I found it to be interesting. You get to see how Sean tackles having enough bricks on hand to build his massive sculptures, how he stores over one million bricks, how he assembles some of his larger sculptures, and how he goes about shipping some of the creations. Stay tuned to the very end if you dare to see how to go about gluing bricks together.

Beyond the Brick did another interview of Sean at a LEGO convention and highlighted some of his work at the Indianapolis zoo a few years back if you want more information.

Have you been to see any of Sean’s work before in person? Let us know in the comments.

Happy building!

Even David Beckham Builds LEGO Sets

Thanks to Zusamengebaut.com for finding this one. Jimmy Fallon interviewed former soccer star David Beckham on “The Tonight Show” and our favorite “highly sophisticated inter-locking brick system” was the topic of conversation. Mr. Beckham’s wife likes to make fun of him on for his bricking hobby, but according to him he loves to build as it helps to calm him. In fact he’ll stay up late into the night to finish up a set.

The clip on YouTube is below. If you don’t want to watch the full thing, skip to the 3 minute mark. That’s when the discussion about the brick begins. And how do I get a free copy of the Millennium Falcon given to me?

Enjoy!

Set Review - #80104-1: Lion Dance

After two regional exclusives where everyone was mad they had to buy on the secondary market, LEGO has stuck to their word. #80103-1: Dragon Boat Race was released in 2019 and in 2020 so far two sets have been released. The first one I’ll review is #80104-1: Lion Dance and it was released on 15 January 2020 in the US for $79.99. With 822 pieces it works out to be $0.91 per piece. I manged to pick it up locally for ~$67 so I can’t complain.

I didn’t do any research behind the traditions behind the set, but the Brother’s Brick did. Check out their set review here if you want to learn more about the choice of colors and symbols used.

The box is bright and colorful with the set displayed on the front with a rat for the”year of the rat.” The back shows some of the play features and details of the set up close.

This set contains six parts bags and an instruction booklet that is wrapped to protect it. Additionally, you’ll notice there is no sticker sheet. WOOHOO!!!! There are a lot of printed elements in this set, but no sticker attachment required.

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The first bag begins with a minifigure holding some lettuce to feed to the lions and two lions with identical builds. The lions both have minifigure legs attached into 2x6 bricks. The remainder of the lion is built off of there. The slopes on the side of the dragon are all printed which was awesome! The lion’s head has some fun details and piece usage with white banana pieces, white frogs, and the printed eye pieces. The head can rotate up and down and the mouth can be opened or closed.

Of note, this bag includes a teal piece separator for when you just can’t pry apart those plates.

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The second bag includes a minifigure with fire crackers, three minifigures who play music (cymbals, a drum, and a gong), and then another dragon with a similar build technique as the previous two, but with some slightly different details and colors.

I like how the musicians were done. Especially the use of a large wheel as a drum. The stand they are on works great to fit them all and they tie into the color scheme of the set well. The drummer is on a spinning piece so you can move him back and forth as if he is drumming.

Lion number three has a slightly different mouth and some gold details along the edge of the body. Other than that, it is built pretty much the same except for the mostly white coloring.

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The third bag is the stage. The lions don’t exactly fit on the stage after it is built and I didn’t try to have a dragon balance on one of the poles like shown on the box. Seems like it would fall over pretty quickly unless you got the center of gravity just so. And while it may not work great for a minifigure, you should definitely check out some of the videos of Lion Dances on YouTube. There are some crazy stunts that they do and the set will make more sense to you after you see what is going on.

The front paneling pieces in the center of the stage are pretty cool though. Could be useful in other MOCs down the road.

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The fourth bag builds the last 2 lions and then a minifigure with Chinese calligraphy on a scroll or tablet. The lions use the same technique as the other 3 only have slightly different coloring with a focus on the color gold.

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Bag 5 starts the gate structure. It’s a simple build, but I am a big fan of the printed tiles. The design on them is very cool and so is the coloring. You also get some more teal pieces and some gold fencing for decoration.

This bag includes an older male minifigure holding a paint brush. Supposedly it is the mayor and he is finishing painting one of the dragons.

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The last bag (number six) finishes off the gate. The roofing is added, more frogs appear, and brightness of color abounds. The yellow and orange really make this gate stand out. I like how the designers achieved the Chinese architectural style without getting too crazy into detailed building.

Lastly, you get a minifigure dressed as a rat for the year of the rat. He rounds out a great assortment of minifigures in the set which help to make the set worthwhile.

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Here’s the final set. Overall I think it’s great. You get 8 minifigures (not including the legs of the lion dancers) and some great pieces. There are no stickers and a lot of great printed pieces with some fun new details. Building this set really made me want to create my own scene with crowds watching, food stands, and other details. I’ll add that to my list of all the things I want to build in my spare time.

I definitely recommend this set and I think this line is worth it. I hope LEGO continues this line and comes up with other similar ones. Hopefully like me, you can find this one on sale to save some money. Just keep in mind that the shelf life of the set will not be long. I believe it is only supposed to be 6 months so don’t wait (can someone confirm that?).

What are your thoughts?

Happy building!