About Bart Willen

Bart Willen (badboytje88) has been a fan of LEGO for as long as he can remember. When he hit puberty and slowly but surely started losing interest in the brick, LEGO released their first line of Harry Potter sets. Keeping Bart from slipping to a Dark Age. He is a fan of a quite broad range of themes, from Star Wars to Johny Thunder and from Elves to City. But somehow he always navigates back to the magical world of Harry Potter. He attends LEGO World in the Jaarbuurs in Utrecht on a yearly basis where he enjoys meeting other fans and seeing some of their creations 'in the brick'. You can check out his own creations here.

Posts by Bart Willen

Blood, sweat and tears – behind the scenes of a medieval construction project

I always wonder what it takes to build a beautiful, weathered LEGO building like the builds of Ralf Langer. His creations always leave me with the same questions. How are all these parts connected? How sturdy is it? Can you pick it up and move it around without it falling apart? What does the inside look like? How does he manage to create such amazing builds? Well, the answer is simple: All it takes is some blood, sweat and tears (and a couple of beers). Ralf’s latest build shows us a little behind the scenes. We can see a castle style building with the scaffolding still next to it. The scaffolding itself is quite cleverly made using lightsaber handles, plates, and a lot of tools.

The building itself is pretty as usual. Ralf uses a lot of different types of bricks to give his builds a weathered look. This also helps to avoid the “big grey wall” effect. The stained glass window is quite cleverly made by attaching transparent round tiles to transparent plates with a string net between them. Unfortunately for me, this behind-the-scenes creations answers none of my questions.

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Vibrantly colored Elven Passage

With his latest creation Chris Perron proves a castle build doesn’t have to consist of mainly grey bricks. It can be vibrantly colored and still look stunning. Chris’s build is sand blue and dark blue with elements of gold. My guess is this windscreen with bubble cutout was the main inspiration for this LEGO creation. Such a smart way to use this part which was designed to be used as a cockpit for a vehicle. The single hinge finger has been cleverly hidden in the base of the model. The model is finished with some lovely trees in funky colors and a diagonal roof pattern I’ve so far only seen used as flooring in other creations. So that’s a nice little bonus right there.

Don’t step into the Shimmer

Bart de Dobbelaer’s latest creation just might be inspired by the movie ‘Annihilation’. In the movie, a team of scientists volunteer to join a research expedition into the Shimmer. The Shimmer is an anomalous iridescent electromagnetic field that appears to be expanding at a rapid pace.

Bart’s creation reminds me of the scene where the team steps through the iridescent electromagnetic field and see the inside of the Shimmer for the first time. They stumble upon all sorts of mutated animal hybrids and a variety of beautiful vegetation. I love the two brown columns on each side of the Shimmer. I have no idea how they are constructed but they look amazing. The contrast between both worlds couldn’t be any bigger. The real world is dark and brown and muddy where the world inside the Shimmer is bright and filled with white and gold alien-like creatures.

The Mountain, the Ocean and the River

I know we’ve featured the windmill before, but Hanwasyellowfirst made two additional builds called ‘Ocean House’ and ‘Riverside Scholars’ and they are exquisite! If these were LEGO sets, I would buy them in a heartbeat! There is a lot of creative parts usage in these buildings. I love how the spoked rounded top window look in combination with the ornamental lattice . There are quite a few different roof designs with all sorts of different parts used for shingles. Did you notice the fish ornamental used on top of the roof. I am not sure if Hanusedtobeyellow used it as a nod to the first LEGO ninja sets or if it is just a coincidence, but I am going for the first option. The riverside scholar building has the ornamental fence on it’s side, which looks stunning. The best thing about this building has to be the framing of the door and the foliage on the roof.

A-frame brings the autumn, uhm, winter A-game

We featured Andrea Lattanzio’s cozy LEGO A-frame home a while ago. It seems however that the A-frame building went through a little bit of a makeover — the autumn theme has been changed to match the current winter season. It looks like the beautiful wooden tiles outside have gotten a fresh coat of red paint. Where the autumn edition of this creation featured minifigure hammers for a cobblestone base wall, the winter edition uses ingot bars for the brick-built wall. The use of the ingots look a bit better-maintained compared to the minifigure hammers, which matches the fresh paint job. One of the small details from the autumn build that I appreciated dearly was the use of mushroom radar dishes. I am glad those got featured in this creation too.

The horse of pestilence

Did you know there is an urban legend about the position of a horse’s legs on a statue? If the horse is rearing, both front legs in the air, the rider died from battle. If one front leg is up that means the rider was wounded in battle. If the horse has all four hooves on the ground, the rider died outside battle. If that legend is true than we might assume that the rider of alex_mocs creation was wounded in battle. His statue to remember his bravery however didn’t stand the test of time. The rider is completely gone (if there ever was a rider). The horse itself is quite okay except for the pestilence growing across it’s back. This creation shows that there can be beauty in decay. I love all the different shapes of the mushrooms and making them white adds a nice contrast to the black horse.

Marrow of the Earth

I have to admit that I am not familiar with the source material for this mysterious being, if there even is source material. Therefore, I can only appreciate this LEGO creation by Anthony Wilson for what it is: a beautiful creation made out of LEGO. The main model of the skeleton looks like it is actually quite sturdy and articulate, and the black cape suits the dark feel of the subject of this creation. Although the entire skeleton appears to be symmetrical, the head isn’t, which gives it character. The rainbow-colored shrubbery adds a very nice contrast to the dark side of the creation. This surely is a beautiful portrayal of life and death.

Sigurd’s Demise

This LEGO creation by VelociJACKtor reminds me of the Nexo Knights LEGO theme. The theme itself was a love-it-or-hate-it kind of theme. If I recall correctly a lot of fans were hoping for a castle theme revival. But they ended up getting not quite what they were hoping for. The theme did however come with a lot of cute knight robots. The little knight in VelociJACKtor’s creation reminds me of these. The dragon neck and head by itself is a lovely build composed of a handful of parts that can be found in numerous LEGO buildable figure sets.

Nazgûl and his Fellbeast

I love it when LEGO fans fill in the gaps in an existing or discontinued licensed theme. Marcin Otreba decided to create a Fellbeast themselves. Fellbeast are the flying creatures that the Nazgûl rode after being unhorsed at the Ford of Bruinen. The fellbeasts were described as large, winged creatures without feathers, that had pinions in between their horned fingers, and whose bodies gave off a stench. I don’t know if Marcin’s creation smells, but I do know it matches the description perfectly and it even moves!

The board game Azul comes to life in LEGO

Toltomeja and I share not one, but two hobbies. We both love playing board games. Toltomeja’s favorite game is Azul, a game which I play quite often myself. Their rendition of the game in LEGO bricks is instantly recognizable. Even if you are not familiar with the game you can still appreciate this creation for what it is, an amazing build with lots of interesting building techniques and a very pleasing aesthetic. They even managed to improve the game board by adding insert slots for the little game cubes. To top it all off they even built the table on which the game board is resting, complete with wood grain and everything.

The Secret of the Sphinx

Johnny Thunder is a theme that always had my interest. He was LEGO’s Indiana Jones before they started producing licensed sets. Johnny has seen it all. From Egypt to the jungle straight to Dino Island. He even went on an Orient Expedition. Ruben Ras shows us an update for LEGO set Sphinx Secret Surprise. Ruben’s rendition of this set is instantly recognizable. Everything is there! The Sphinx, the tent, the desert car, and the obelisk covered in brick-built (!) hieroglyphs. As if that were not enough he even swapped the raised base plate for a brick-built base. Of course, this ‘set’ comes with all the main characters: Baron von Barron, Dr. Charles Lightning, Johnny Thunder, Lord Sam Sinister, Miss Gail Storm, Pharaoh Hotep, and a skeleton mummy. Every single character got an update. The best thing about this has to be that not a single sticker was used.

Absolutely Riddikulus!

Ekjohnson1 shows us that even though LEGO did their best, a good figure can always be improved. The figure in the spotlight is the second edition of the Snape Boggart from the Harry Potter franchise. Although LEGO did a splendid job on creating this figure, it didn’t fully capture the description in the books:

“You will raise your wand — thus — and cry ‘Riddikulus’ — and concentrate hard on your grandmother’s clothes. If all goes well, Professor Boggart Snape will be forced into that vulture-topped hat, and that green dress, with that big red handbag.”

The builder has added the green dress and topped the hat off with a crow, formerly of the Scarecrow CMF. Placing said figure in a well lit diorama complete with a brick built wardrobe and a quite easy yet effective chandelier using the knob wheel and some small flames, makes for one stellar shot.