Posts by Jake Forbes

The Botanical Garden gets a modular makeover with charm to spare

LEGO releases one new modular set a year, but every so often there’s a set that is modular-adjacent that fans of the line wish could better integrate with their collection. The Chinese New Year restaurant, French Cafe, and especially 2023’s lovely Friends Botanical Garden (which predated the minifig scale Botanical Garden which is even more modular-adjacent). Modular builder Melanie found a solution to integrate the Friends garden into her city by turning the conservatory a two-story corner unit using a design by MingBrick. I adore the park bench and cherry blossom tree at the base of the stairs adding a parklet at street level that fits perfectly with the sidewalk aesthetic of other modulars.

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UCS Jango Fett’s Starship leads Star Wars Day wave of LEGO sets [News]

On May the Fourth, aka Star Wars Day, LEGO is releasing an eclectic mix of sets and exclusives from across the franchise. Jango Fett is the MVP of this wave, with 75409 UCS Jango Fett’s Starship and his headpiece joining past Mandalorian designs in the Helmet Collection. Celebrating 10 years since his angsty debut, Kylo Ren also features with a buildable helmet and 75606 Kylo Ren’s Command Shuttle at midi-scale. Andor is back with 75399 Rebel U-Wing Starfighter, and rans of Rebels and Ahsoka will be thrilled to see 75416 Chopper (c1-10P) at a scale to match the latest R2D2 set. A mix of Gifts with Purchase will accompany the sets. Look for our reviews coming soon.

We’re going in for all the Star Wars details. Cover me, Porkins!

Comic book characters bound from the page in bricks [Minifig Monday]

Ever since Spider-Man appeared in minifig form as part of the LEGO Studios line, superheroes have been a staple of the toymaker’s catalog, in official sets and collectible minifig series, with minifig spins on iconic characters even getting their own films and video games. LEGO has released some pretty deep-cut heroes (especially those controversial Comic-Con exclusives), but no amount of official sets can keep up with all the characters that have ever appeared in print. This week we’ll take a look at some creative spins on comic characters from the big two of DC and Marvel and beyond.

Our first character is The Batman Who Laughs, the evil universe jokerfied version of Bruce Wayne, courtesy of piotrbricks. Piotr first shared this a few years back, but it remains one of the sickest superhero designs using all official parts that I’ve ever seen. The cartoony grin of Joker from The LEGO Batman Movie is so eerie coming from the Dark Knight’s cowl, especially with rubber bands covering the eyes.

Now for something completely different, Polish builder ponuryy pays tribute to stars of bandes dessinées Asterix and Obelisk on their trip to Egypt. Their druid friend Getafix incorporates newer elements for the head, but his vintage legs seem inspired by this take from OG AFOL Michael Jasper.

Read on for more custom comic book minifigs

Join our haunted tour of this epic LEGO lair for New Orleans vampires

Jeff Chapman has carved out a place in the LEGO builder scene with a bloody knife, specializing in the macabre with a historical twist. While most of his creations so far have centered around Salem, for his latest build, Jeff travels south to New Orleans, another American city brimming with haunted history. Like his New England builds, Jeff bases his model on a real-world location, in this case an iconic corner building on Royal Street that was home to the legendary Jacques St Germain, the French Quarter vampire!

Jeff’s models are always best experienced via narrated tour of history and build process on his Spooky Brixx YouTube channel, which you can watch here. Or skip down to a photo gallery for more pics of this haunted masterpiece.

Grab some garlic and a state and read on for a tour of Jeff’s French Quarter masterpiece… if you dare!

“Even the greatest LEGO builders are forgotten someday”

At first glance, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End looks like a pretty standard D&D-infused anime adventure, but all it takes is one episode to know you’ve found something special. The beloved series about friendship and loss and the passing of time is told from the point of view of Frieren, an elf who ages much slower than her former questing companions. Joffre Zheng pays tribute to the heroes who slew the Demon King in LEGO form. From left to right, Fern, Stark, Frieren, Heiter, Himmel, and Eisen are lovingly recreated in the Miniland style, each proportioned to match the anime and manga. I especially like the way Joffre captures Heiter’s signature pose, hand on chest. It’s a beautiful ode to a series that reminds us that no matter how much time we have left, friendship matters.

How to step up your stair game in microscale [Building Techniques]

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is famous for dropping players into a world and letting them walk anywhere the eye can see. To help players navigate, the designers use landmarks that can be seen from far away like Markarth Guard Tower, recreated here in LEGO microscale by Isaac Snyder. Fans of the game will recognize it thanks to the orange dome, but microscale builders might want to cast their gaze lower at the steps where Isaac finds a clever means of adding 5 risers at just over a stud’s width using nested panels. The configuration only allows for the top panel to have a SNOT connection, but by boxing in the stairs, friction gets the job done.

The Belafonte, home to Team Zissou, gets the retro LEGO treatment

Every so often, I’ll stumble upon a LEGO model that has accidental Wes Anderson vibes, but this cross-section of the Belafonte from The Life Aquatic is definitely Wes Anderson on purpose. Builder Eddie Marshall deliberately sticks to the look of classic LEGO sets from the 80s and 90s, fitting for a film that was itself a nostalgic tribute to the late 70s adventures of Jaques Cousteau. Eddie captures most of the Belafonte‘s rooms in a miniature tableau, with most of the crew represented in simple minifig form. Sometimes it’s nice to take a break from dozens of colors, NPU, and amazing SNOT techniques and unwind with a build that could have drifted in from another era.

If you need a refresher on the Belafonte and its crew, Martin Balazs offers an animated tour of his incredibly detailed LEGO version.

This Week in LEGO Bricks: The Catbus/Dark Knight Returns

Nothing that happens in the LEGO building scene gets past our friend ABrickDreamer! Once again he’s here with a round-up of the week’s essential LEGO stories. A few highlights: Star Wars fans will appreciate this TIE Fighter technique breakdown from Tips&Bricks, seeing Middle Earth’s Edoras come together will tide you over after building the Shire, and of course lots of Studio Ghibli builds!

How to wring iron elegance from unlikely elements [Building Techniques]

In celebration of spring’s arrival, Flatland Brick shares a charming LEGO build of a gardener tending to the season’s first blooms. The real star of this scene is the wrought iron bench. The builder draws on some clever parts for the ornate metalwork, such as umbrellas for the armrests, minifig hands for the rear legs, and a samurai headpiece for the back. The cleverest techniques are hidden until you flip the build around.

Link treads are used to hold the wooden slats in place at a subtle angle. They also offer connection points for the antennae that hold up the horns! LEGO kicked off the trend of finding unusual black elements to use as wrought iron in the earliest modulars, turning screwdrivers, harpoons, and skeleton feet into railings. Flatland Brick shows how much room there is to innovate, especially with parts like the tank treads that offer unconventional anchor points.

Earthly Phoenix is a heavenly LEGO creation

In Chinese mythology, the peacock is seen as the earthly manifestation of the legendary phoenix, fènghuáng. Builder Jim Jo combines imagery of heaven and earth for this incredible LEGO tribute to the majestic bird. The peacock model is striking on its own, especially the cascading tail made from an alternating series of 2×1 plates and 1×1 rounds. The use of color is incredible as blues fade into greens. (We’ve noted before, Jim is a master of color!)

“De fènghuáng” is perched across a blossoming branch. In order to support the weight of the bricks, Jim constructed the branch around a custom metal armature. The pixel moon is built on a transparent baseplate so that it can be backlit. Sculpture, mosaic, and still life come together for a creation as heavenly as the phoenix.

Ferrix speeder for Andor butts

Finding an on-screen vehicle from Star Wars that hasn’t been built hundreds of times over in LEGO is tougher than making the Kessel Run in under 12 parsecs, but builder Gregory Coquelz found inspiration in a speeder with a few seconds of screen time in Andor Season 1, Episode 3. The Ferrix Riot Speeder has the chunky aesthetics and weathered body you’d expect from a dusty salvage planet. Built at Miniland scale let Gregory pack the speeder with greebles. I appreciate the inclusion of old, yellowed grey bricks from a more civilized era, before bley and blasters.

To help the curious view the speeder from every angle, Gregory shared a video that you can see below. Only two more weeks until Andor Season 2 kicks off. No doubt we’ll get more amazing blink-and-you’ll-miss-it vehicles to inspire future builds!

Gayle Spiller’s enchanting LEGO box dioramas [Interview]

Gayle Spiller turns whimsical ideas into inspiring LEGO models packed with detail. Her builds, like the Butterfly Collector, are so dense with imaginative use of parts, you can get lost in them. In 2023, Gayle joined the exclusive group of builders to be featured at the LEGO House Masterpiece Gallery. In recent months, Gayle has been playing with a new, cozier build format – one that, like minifig habitats, could inspire builders looking to make their own MOCs from their favorite pieces who might be intimidated by larger constructions. We checked in with Gayle to talk about her latest series and life with LEGO since her invitation to Billund.

TBB: First of all, congratulations on being chosen as one of the latest builders invited to display your creations at the Masterpiece Gallery at LEGO House. What was it like to learn that your works would be displayed in Billund? What was it like meeting the other amazing builders and the LEGO team? Has anything changed in your relationship with LEGO building since your works were spotlighted?

Gayle: Thank you. Being asked to exhibit at the Lego Masterpiece Gallery 2023/24 was a complete surprise and I definitely had imposter syndrome. It was a fantastic experience and I loved meeting the other builders who I had admired online for so long. It was interesting to learn about their building methods, how for instance Zach produces some of his spectacular pieces in only 3 hours. That was a revelation and definitely inspired me to scale down and create something that would take a weekend to finish rather than some of my larger projects which have taken months.

Click to see more of Gayle’s immersive box dioramas

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