About Lino

Lino is an artist, humorist, and occasional responsible adult. He is the co-founder of a challenge-based LEGO car club called LUGNuts which boasts over 1100 members worldwide. He proposed automotive building challenges every month for ten years (120 challenges!) which he and the other members built accordingly. LUGNuts has retired its challenges on its 10th anniversary but still remains a cornerstone for LEGO automotive builders. Between his artistic work and LEGO builds, Lino has been published in several books, including Beautiful LEGO, Beautiful LEGO: Dark, and Beautiful LEGO: Wild. He lives in Washington with his girlfriend and dogs.

Posts by Lino

The planet Duplovia processes water so you don’t have to

What’s happening on the planet Duplovia? According to Wami Delthorn they process water there. It’s fun to just (ahem) soak in all the details. It has enough Classic Space LEGO goodness and playability to quench the thirst of any diehard fan. I’m particularly loving the communications tower, spaceship landing pad and the space train that traverses the entire build. The LED lights are also a neat touch. With all this expensive and important science-y space stuff I hope they utilize this water processing plant for something useful, intelligent and practical; like fueling the galaxy’s largest and most epic Slip ‘N Slide!

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The Hells Angels set the stage in this massive moving WWI diorama

With the exception of the past couple of years, I’ve been a staple at BrickCon in Seattle since 2005 or so. This year, I wasn’t a registrant but snuck in unnoticed (almost). While there, I was treated to this wonderous LEGO stage show put on by Douglas Hughes. The table presence of this massive creation was quite impressive, even with the curtains closed. But as the curtains parted, the intro music started and the real show began! As described by the builder, “As the curtains part you can see biplanes circling both above and below the zeppelin which maneuvers up and down.The soundtrack transitions to biplane maneuver and machine gun noises, and a red biplane swoops to the center stage from behind a cloud, gently rocking back and forth. Soon enough the red plane sidles back behind cloud cover and the finale begins to unfold – a little biplane corkscrews down in an uncontrolled dive until it hits the zeppelin.” He goes on to say; “Red lights flash, explosions rock the air, and the zeppelin slowly breaks apart revealing smoke and fire rising from within. The curtains begin to close and the finale fanfare plays – the show is over!”

I guess you had to have been there. No, seriously, you had to have been there! The builder hasn’t provided a video of this beast on motion just yet but I can attest that this was an amazing work of art. I didn’t stick around long enough to find out, but this had to have won one of the top prizes, I’m sure. Chime in in the comments to let us know what awards this won or just to tell us what you think.

An Ewok Village redo and redemption

A LEGO builder who goes by the name of Simulterious tells us that they took apart the Ewok Village 10236 set and regretted it. Yeah, we know all about regret here at TBB, don’t we? Wait, what the hell does that mean? Anyway, they turned their regret into a redo and redemption of sorts by building a new version depicting what the set could look like today. I’m enjoying the use of shields as sort of a thatched roof design and the diversity of leaves is a welcome change from the old set. This builder also rectifies the obvious omission of the AT-ST from the original. Even though there seem to be slightly fewer Minifigures (that are visible, anyway) this would be an insta-buy for me if this were a real set. While we most certainly have our regrets, (wait, that again?) showcasing this builder’s work isn’t among them. Check out our Simulterious archives to see what I mean.

Do not be alarmed. This is only a (man)drill.

LEGO builder Dan Ko has been producing a lot of small stuff lately but we’ve clearly been mighty impressed, by golly! He takes a couple of blue bike helmets, a red lightsaber handle, a Minifigure beard and a few other pieces to cleverly construct this mandrill bust. There is so much character and expression for such a small build. It’s part of what makes Dan’s work so impressive. This is only a LEGO mandrill but I’d still advise not to make eye contact, just in case. While trying to keep peace with this primate, you ought to back away (very slowly, and for the love of God, don’t show your teeth!) and check out the myriad of other neat little things Dan Ko has built lately.

A whale of an idea

As an artist and a LEGO builder, I really enjoy refreshing approaches to building. This bold piece by filbrick looks as if it was made with cut paper. There are eight visible colored layers of brick here, including the stylish white frame. Each is spaced out a bit to create shadows between each distinct layer. I love how some layers showcase various coral and sea plants. And that bold white humpback whale, diver and fish against the dark background is a superb and striking effect. I imagine this could look lovely standing on a table or as a wall hanging. If you like this as much as I do, the builder leaves a not-so-subtle reminder that this can be voted as a LEGO Ideas set. You can use that information as you see fit. This is not the first time we’ve been in awe of filbrick’s work. Click the little blue link to see what I mean.

A teeny-tiny Typhoon airstrike

LEGO builder Greyson proves you don’t need a metric crap-ton of bricks to build something neat. Here’s an adorable RAF Typhoon built from seemingly just over twenty parts. We salute you, Grayson!

It’s like a window into my paunchy, balding soul

Felix Jaensch has used about 14,500 LEGO pieces to build this rather unflattering fellow and now I wonder if he has caught a glimpse of me checking the mail. Paunchy, check. balding, check. Coffee stains, socks, and sandals, disheveled appearance, surly attitude; check, check, check and check. I don’t recall giving you permission to build me in LEGO, you jerk! Upon closer inspection though, Felix tells us this figure is 175 cm tall, which is slightly taller than I am, so we can now add short to my list of qualifications as a slovenly malcontent. At least he didn’t swipe my total likeness after all. This dude bears a close resemblance to Carl from Aqua Teen Hunger Force but it isn’t quite him. Felix doesn’t state a specific person in his write-up but he’s a fairly average representation of what a lot of us are like.

See him in his full, coffee-stained, grumpy, socks and Adiletten-wearing glory.

Building life-sized sculptures are pretty much Felix’s thing. Check out our Felix Jaensch archives to see what I mean. Now get off my lawn, you ingrates!

Why sort when you can Groot?

Famed LEGO builder Dan Ko described a phenomenon that most of us know too well. He had a brown chair piece sitting out at his desk collecting dust for quite some time so instead of sorting it into its proper bin, he decided to build Groot with it. Then he figured, what’s Groot without his BFF Rocket? So because of Dan’s-laziness, I guess- we can all admire a quick little built chock full of fun character. Sorting can be a tedious business. You tell yourself you’re going to get to it someday and reach LEGO builder nirvana, which is zero brick unsorted, but then days turn into months and months into years, and, in the case of some of my friends, you have about an Olympic-sized swimming pool worth of unsorted brick. Do you all know anyone who has reached LEGO-sorting nirvana? Because I sure don’t!

Greenhouse symbiosis on Exobudria 9

Once again famed LEGO builder Bart De Dobbelaer is the Supreme leader when it comes to fleshing out unsettling alien worlds. In his own words he tells us; “With little to no natural light keeping greenhouses on Exobudria 9 seemed impossible. But thanks to a clever symbiosis with the indigenous insects, the light and warmth of their hives proved to be exactly what the plants needed.” True to his style, he provides just enough clues to entice you in, like the opening scene of a great sci-fi movie, then leaves you wanting to know more. Like what exactly are those plants for? What’s with all those greebly bits? And why is space so damned creepy? Check out our Bart De Dobbelaer archives that will likely answer none of these questions but is enticing as heck anyway.

Midwife /ˈmidˌwīf/ (noun) a person (typically a woman) trained to assist women in childbirth

Do you know why we’ve seen an influx of LEGO crab creations lately? No seriously, do you? Because we’re pretty confused on the matter. We featured this one a few days back, then this one followed by this other one and now Ivan Martynov presents his crab simply called Midwife. I’m not sure if this qualifies as TMI or not but we’re pretty sure there are also other crabs infesting our various cracks and crevices. Despite the burning and itching, I rather like the odd color scheme and bio-mechanical feel of this design. The multiple eyes are quite unsettling and it appears as if she’s manifesting smaller pink crabs from her own head. It really takes me back to high school prom night! Anyway, check out all the other reasons why Ivan Martynov kinda gets under our skin.

Serving up a pint of awesomeness with an exclusive interview with model car designer Tom Daniel [Feature]

Sure we all love to build with LEGO but, chances are, you may have dipped your toes into other toys and hobbies as well. Before rediscovering LEGO, I was an avid model car builder and collector of Hot Wheels cars (and still am!). Hot-rodding legend Tom Daniel holds a special place in my heart as his outlandish show rod models and Hot Wheels casts such as the Beer Wagon, and Red Baron is still popular and sought-after toys today. You may recall that LEGO legend Andrea Lattanzio built Tom Daniel’s Paddy Wagon a couple years back. To be clear, Andrea’s Beer Wagon (pictured below) dates back a few years as well but it was never featured here at the time. Recently he sat down with Tom Daniel for an interview and if you ask me, that’s pretty thrilling!

Some highlights of note from the interview; the Beer wagon was Tom’s first design for Monogram models, then came the Red Baron and his career pretty much skyrocketed from there. Overnight Daniel dreamed up the Munster Koach for George Barris, although the credit for the design by Daniel often gets misstated. He also designed the Bat Cycle for the 1960s Batman television series. Tom Daniel also flew for the U.S. Navy during the Cuban Missile Crisis and worked as a Design Engineer for the APOLLO MOON Project. Of course you may read the entire interview here.

We’re rather proud of Andrea’s achievements. He was voted The Brothers Brick Builder of the Year in 2019. He’s still quite the prolific builder nowadays. We raise our glasses high in salute to him. Check out why we think Andrea Lattanzio is a pint of premium brew.

I have a need for ‘pede!

We truly don’t mean to feature every last LEGO creation Caleb Flutur has built lately but damn, son, that guy is prolific! He’s clearly having the best week ever with his series of Steampunk-inspired creepy crawlies. He says he’ll be posting one a day until…we don’t know when. We’re amused, if not a bit bugged out. We can feature other things but the rest of youse haven’t exactly been doing anything to exterminate this onslaught of jeepers-creepers. You know who you are! Build something, will ya? We just might feature it. In the meantime, check out some other things that bug us imensely.

About Lino

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