Posts by Theo Spencer

Cactus makes perfect

I love a bit of meta in a LEGO build. Eli Willsea is taking part in Iron Builder, where the challenge is to use the watering can piece in new and unusual ways. Now a watering can is a tool to help keep your plants alive. So Eli has used it to bring a plant to life in brick form! But why not go further? Why not choose a plant that is famous for not needing a lot of water, like a cactus? Now we’ve got a hint of irony involved too! Pretty much all that’s missing now is a good pun. What to do for that, I wonder…

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Classic LEGO set Majisto’s Magical Workshop re-imagined as Gift with Purchase 40601 [News]

Not content with releasing nostalgia-laden sets, LEGO has also been re-visiting some smaller classics as Gifts with Purchase. If you picked up 40567 Forest Hideout, the latest offering is sure to be worth a look as well. 40601 Majisto’s Magical Workshop is an update of the 1993 set of the same name. Composed of 365 pieces, also included are the titular wizard Majisto, alongside a female Dragon Knight. At the time of writing there is no information on how much you’ll need to spend to get your hands on it, or how long it will be available for. That said, LEGO Insiders weekend is coming at the end of this week, so there’s a good chance it will be available then.

Click here to see more pictures of this re-imagined classic

Enjoying the fruits of one’s labour

After a long day’s work, some people might like to reward themselves with a drink of, er, grape juice. But sometimes, making the grape juice is the long day’s work! This is the lesson Martin Gebert‘s LEGO diorama teaches us. Partly, that is down to its content as it depicts how wine was made back in Antiquity. The grapes are picked, then crushed, then the juice is transferred to a storehouse to ferment into wine. But it’s also a lesson in teamwork. There’s a small team of minifigures at work here, and indeed Martin is part of a team himself! This diorama is part of an enormous collaboration that appeared at Bricking Bavaria, in Germany, last week. And although we can’t taste the wine (or grape juice) made here, we can still enjoy the fruits of Martin’s labour!

Take a country break in this art-nouveau villa

So you’ve been into town, you’ve visited the LEGO bank that Eero Okkonen built, and now you feel like you need a bit of a break from the hustle and bustle of city life. Luckily, Eero has you sorted for accommodation there too! Why not head down to Villa Mauski for a short stay? It’s just as art-nouveau, but with all the peace and quiet the Nordic forests do so well. You don’t even need to chop wood for the fire, the wood shelter is already full of 1×4 arch pieces for that!

Round the back, you’ve got a slice of forest to call your own in case you do need more wood. But those trees are so pretty, it would seema waste to chop them down! There are a lot of good uses of the so-called macaroni tube here. As in Eero’s previous architectural build, they’re used as a motif on the villa’s archway, but they’re also in the smoke and in the trees. You know, maybe just a short stay is not long enough to spend in Villa Mauski!

A spaceship that’s a head-turner and a head-scratcher

You ever look at a LEGO creation, and feel your brain going into overdrive trying to figure out how it was made? That’s what’s happening with Caleb Ricks‘ Dragonfly Interceptor here. For starters, the unusual colour scheme – primarily light aqua – almost makes it look like a digital build. But no, this one is fully 100% real. Which means Caleb must have somehow figured out a way to make all of these mad angles match up while accounting for pesky physics. And he’s worked that cockpit piece in around three 6×6 inverted cone pieces! The whole design is really unique. Maybe it’s best just to appreciate its beauty without thinking about the internals, though. I need a lie down after trying that!

More 2024 LEGO sets revealed, including Monkie Kid, Friends, and Lunar New Year [News]

The 2024 LEGO set news keeps on coming. A handful of LEGO sets have appeared on LEGO.com today, while two more have been revealed at the China International Import Expo. As might be expected, most of the sets are in the ever-expanding line-up of sets surrounding Chinese traditions and folklore, such as 80112 Auspicious Dragon. Of particular note though is an enormous Monkie Kid set, 80054 Megapolis City 5th Anniversary. This set features 2,330 pieces and a modular construction.

Most of these sets will be available for purchase from LEGO.com from January 1, 2024. Scroll through the full article below to see all the photos, with pricing and part count details (where available).

See more pictures after the jump

The frog mecha-army leaps into action!

Everyone’s got their favourite LEGO element. It might be the popular headlight brick, or something completely rogue like a Clikits flower. (Hey, each to their own!) I have a sneaky feeling that some of Simon Liu‘s favourite pieces are those pertaining to frogs. Why? Well, he’s listed as a Frog King in a group on Flickr, for starters. And the Frog King has assembled an amphibian army to do his bidding! This exosuit for the rank-and-file, for instance, houses a Super Mario frog hat.

Click here to see what other frog parts have got an armoured upgrade!

January 2024 LEGO sets revealed, including Jurassic Park T-Rex Skull, Minecraft, Super Mario, & Sonic the Hedgehog [News]

2024 is only a couple of months away now, and German retailer JB Spielwaren have unveiled a host of LEGO sets slated for release in the new year. These cover the Jurassic World/Jurassic Park, Super Mario, Minecraft, and Sonic the Hedgehog themes. While most of them are playsets, the highlight for adult builders and collectors is likely to be 76964 Dinosaur Fossils: T-Rex Skull. This set contains 577 pieces, for a retail price of US $39.99 | CAN $49.99 | UK £34.99. The name suggests it could be the start of a series. Here’s hoping!

The Jurassic World sets are the only ones we have global recommended retail prices for, but we do at least have prices in euros for the others. You can see prices and pictures after the jump!

Click to see the other sets coming next January

Winter is coming? No, winter is already here!

For some, this time of year is closely associated with falling leaves, scarves and things being suddenly pumpkin-flavoured for a few weeks. But for those of us in the more Northerly latitudes, autumn is already starting to look like Michał Kozłowski‘s wintry scene. In fact, as I type this, there are two inches of snow forecast in a few days, and muggins here still haven’t changed over to winter tyres. How did they manage that in medieval LEGO villages? Do you think they had horsecarts with studded wheels? Or did the horses just have to look for the studs to lock themselves in? You’d have to hope your builder hasn’t exclusively used slopes and tiles to model their snow.

Briiiiiiicks... Briiiicks!

The stereotype for zombies is that they wander aimlessly, looking for brains. But Dan Ko‘s is a little different. If you listen closely, you’ll find that some of them aren’t actually looking for brains, but for bricks. It seems even AFOLs aren’t safe from the zombie apocalypse. Brains are no good! Zombified Fans of LEGO (ZFOLs) need bricks to fill their heads with. This one has turned to a pink roller skate, which by coincidence does look a bit like a regular brain. All the better to blend in with the horde of the undead!

Back in the middle ages, you had to find a real haunted castle for thrills

Haunted houses are a well-worn trope of scary stories, but if we’re talking buildings with ghosts in them, surely castles are more likely to be haunted? They’re older, have often seen their fair share of battles, and are sometimes spooky enough in their own right. Chi Hsin Wei gets it. Now, if you presented this castle to me in a brochure, I’d probably think it was some exhilarating ride at a theme park. Spooky, sure, but not full of real ghosts. Probably. But those adventurers in the boat don’t look like they’re here for a thrill ride. Going to a castle that looks like it wants to eat you is probably a bit far to go for an adrenaline rush. The teacup rides are scary enough for me, thank you very much.

LEGO Ideas 40595 Tribute to Galileo Galilei Gift with Purchase: Will it do the Fandango? [Review]

Of late, we’ve had quite a few LEGO Gifts with Purchase that have come from the LEGO Ideas platform. We’ve also had some based on historical figures. Now, the two streams have been crossed in the form of 40595 Tribute to Galileo Galilei, the winning submission in the Ready, Set, Go STEM! contest. It will be available from the 1st to 16th of November, with purchases totalling US $130 | CAN $TBD | UK £130 on the LEGO website or in LEGO brick-and-mortar retail stores. But is it worth stumping up the cash for the two weeks that it’s available? Read on 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.

Click to read our full review!