Posts by Theo Spencer

LEGO Icons 11375 Ferrari F2004 & Michael Schumacher: a dominant display [Review]

Reading patterns into LEGO’s release schedule is normally a fool’s errand. The minute you think you can guess what set is coming next based on what’s been before, the pattern changes. That said, after previous years saw releases of the McLaren MP4/4 and Williams FW14B – two of the most famous Formula One cars ever – the next car in this fledgling series should be a surprise to no one. The Ferrari F2004 dominated the, well, 2004 season, and propelled Michael Schumacher to a record 7th drivers’ title. From March 1, you’ll be able to build your own thanks to LEGO Icons 11375 Ferrari F2004 & Michael Schumacher. It has an RRP of USD/CAD/GBP, with 735 pieces. Will it dominate the competition like its real-life counterpart? Only one way to find out!

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

LEGO Icons 11375 Ferrari F2004 & Michael Schumacher | 735 Pieces | Available March 1, 2026 | US $89.99 | CAN $119.99 | UK £79.99

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The (arena) floor is lava in this grisly LEGO gladiatoral match-up

You know what’s gnarly? A fight. You know what’s gnarlier? A fight to the death. But gnarlier than that? A fight to the death over lava! This quick escalation is the work of LEGO lord Dan O’Connor. And such a grisly spectacle invites plenty of grisly characters. The crowd comes from all walks of LEGO life: Monster Hunters, Galaxy Squad, Lord of the Rings, Legends of Chima, and of course a variety of Castle themes.

I’m not sure which would be worse in front of such an expectant crowd: being out-manoeuvred by your opponent, or tripping over yourself and ending up in the lava before you even get to said opponent. I do know which one I’d be more likely to do though…

When life won’t give you horses, use giant deer or spiders instead

Anyone who’s a castle fan – LEGO or otherwise – has surely pictured a glamorous knight riding astride a horse towards fame and glory. But not everyone has access to horses. Sometimes, you just have to make do with whatever creatures live nearby. Simulterious has not just one, but two terrific examples of some alternative beasts of burden for us! On the right, we appear to have a variation of a deer. This makes sense – they’re kinda close to horses right? Just be careful not to hit the antlers when swingin your sword. On the left, something altogether more terrifying: an orc riding a spider. I love the effect of the flaming fireballs being launched from the back-mounted catapult! I dread to think how tricky it must be to tame a spider though. Then again, I suppose orcs are made of stern stuff.

LEGO Knights of the Square Table

I’m sure every one of us has an unusual LEGO part that they remember from their childhood. Perhaps it’s some of the original buildable LEGO figures, or something from the barely-LEGO Scala theme. What really activates my nostalgia is these fold-out racetracks from LEGO Racers sets. A racetrack that doubles as a box?! How cool is that! The flip-side of such unusual parts is that they can be difficult to incorporate into MOCs. Such trivialities don’t scare Mattia Careddu, though. Even then, of all the things to turn it into, I never would’ve thought of a rectangular knight!

But wait! It’s not just a knight and its minions. Mattia has stayed true to the unfolding nature of the racetrack, and this knight turns into a base of operations for the smaller ones! Weapons storage, siege lessons, tools and repairs – it’s all here. It harkens back to a different style of toy entirely. It’s even got its own superbly edited TV commercial!

Nothing beats a good cup of tea... Except maybe a great LEGO build

At the risk of sounding excessively British: there is no problem that can’t be solved over a good cup of tea. My preference is for English Breakfast (strong, milk, two sugars), but that maxim doesn’t need to be restricted to certain types of tea! For Taj: Brick Minstrel‘s slice of Arabian life, chai is the drink of choice. And now we know what the tea is, we need to know what the tea is. (I gather that’s what the kids are calling gossip these days.) Are these three discussing matters of science, or economics, or politics, or philosophy? Or are they discussing more serious matters, such as how far you could walk barefoot on LEGO bricks?i

I Spy a LEGO puzzle, discovered two years too late

Better late than never. But does it depend on how late? Looking at this photo, you might be forgiven for thinking it’s nearly 30 years late – especially if you grew up with the I SPY book series. But in actual fact, we’re only a couple of years late for this one. The photo is not taken by Walter Wick, but by John Reily. We’ve only just come across his series of photos made as on homage to the original Wick and Jean Marzollo books. This is our favourite of the bunch, with its mix of scales and reflections! Can you find everything mentioned in the rhyme?

The Brothers Brick LEGO Builder of the Year 2025 [News]

So 2025 has been and gone, the dust has settled from the New Year’s celebrations, and the last of the champagne has just about left our systems. But we have one final bit of business to attend to from last year: the coronation of the Brothers Brick’s LEGO Builder of the Year! As a reminder, our shortlist is over here. And man, what a stacked list! How do we pick out a winner from that? Well, our builders of the year tend to cover a lot of bases, and often their achievements extend beyond merely making great LEGO models. Ultimately, it’s about consistency across the whole year.

And the key to determining this year’s Builder of the Year actually came while curating our Creations of the Year shortlist, as our victor had several builds that could’ve made the cut for the shortlist alone. The Brothers Brick are delighted to crown Seigo Aoki, who builds under the handle DeRa, as our Builder of the Year 2025!

Click here for a retrospective on DeRa’s terrific 2025!

The Brothers Brick LEGO Creation of the Year 2025 [News]

Woah, wait a minute! We’re already nearly a week into 2026? How did that happen? While we figure that out where those days went, it’s about time we announced the winner of our annual Creation of the Year prize. This year’s shortlist was one of the toughest to judge in the ten years we’ve been doing so. A baker’s dozen of incredible builds, from creators new and known to us alike, across a wide range of media and subject matter. And indeed, it’s a new builder who’s taking the crown this year! Despite only starting to share their builds in 2025, they quickly established themselves as something of a castle specialist. Which makes sense – they are known as cathedralofbricks, after all!

And the cream of the crop for us was this superbly furnished Moroccan palace. So congratulations to Luke (cathedralofbricks) and his Delights of Marrakech build, which we are declaring the Brothers Brick’s LEGO Creation of the Year 2025!

Click here for a reminder of what made this Moroccan marvel so magnificent!

Who says LEGO gold is hard to build from?

We often talk on this website about how hard it is to make LEGO creations out of gold. Not literal gold, obviously, although presumably that is also quite difficult. Goldsmiths, get in touch and let us know. No, gold-coloured LEGO bricks have traditionally been limited to just a few select parts, making it quite hard to build anything substantial out of them. Not that you’d know that from looking at Joe Lam‘s hall of armours! These 12 sacred Cloths form a key part of the manga and anime Saint Seiya, and are all based on the zodiac signs. Joe’s build represents each one superbly! Can you spot them all?

The second bird catches the fish – after it’s been rebuilt

Just because Sakiya Watanabe has been nominated for our LEGO Creation of the Year, doesn’t mean he’s going to rest on his laurels! And just to reinforce that dedication to improving his craft, here he presents an updated version of the bald eagle we featured 10 months back. We were full of praise at the time, but Sakiya wasn’t satisfied. The curse of the perfectionist! In case you can’t spot the differences, they include an updated tail, water splash and head. The photo angle also appears to have been carefully selected to better hide some of the underlying structure. There is one thing that hasn’t changed, however. We’re just as awe-struck this time around!

Shortlist announced for TBB’s Builder of the Year 2025 [News]

By now, you will have seen our shortlist for our annual Creation of the Year award. What?! You haven’t? Well head on over here to see it! It’s one thing to create one, year-defining build. It’s another thing entirely to consistently hit such heady heights in multiple builds over the course of a year. That’s what our Builder of the Year award celebrates!

This might be someone whose builds were just too good not to feature over and over again (think last year’s winner, Maxx Davidson). They might have achieved success in other spheres, such as winning contests (Jonas Kramm won his Iron Builder round in 2017) or gaining LEGO Ideas sets (Sandro Quattrini, 2021). Or perhaps they showed growth, taking their builds to new heights like Dicken Liu did in 2023. What will set our 2025 winner apart? Take a look at our shortlist and cast your vote in the comments!

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TBB’s best and worst sets of 2025 [Feature]

We at the Brothers Brick got through quite a lot of LEGO this year. We had 81 reviews penned by both in-house and guest writers, and that’s not even counting the sets we bought of our own volition! As you know, we’re an opinionated bunch. We all have our favourites: LEGO kits that wowed us with new parts, interesting techniques, or just downright charm. On the other hand, you can’t win them all, and there were a fair few duds this year too. We’ve listed some of our picks for both categories below. Agree or disagree? Tell us in the comments! What were your most and least favourite sets from 2025?

Let’s get the bad out the way first, shall we?

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