Category Archives: Building Techniques

Not sure what SNOT is? Want to learn innovative new ways to create awesome LEGO models of your own? Peruse our posts about LEGO building techniques to pick up tricks & tips from the best.

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.

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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.

Nothing says springtime like puffy white clouds [Building Techniques]

This rock-covered hill with billowing clouds by Caleb Saw is giving me serious Howl’s Moving Castle vibes, or really, almost any Studio Ghibli film. The soft focus on the background would help hide the many connections used to assemble the cumulus clouds if Caleb hadn’t done such a masterful job of doing that themselves. Can you spot the many unique elements used? There must be at least 10 different radar dishes, domes, and curved slopes used, not to mention some balloon parts.

The world’s smallest LEGO castle? [Building Techniques]

I’ve seen some small castles in my time, heck, I’ve even built some, but this island castle by Nikita Filatov has got to be one of the smallest. The minifigure binoculars are great as tiny towers, but my favorite part is the rounded white tile balanced on the back of an ingot. But the great techniques don’t stop there. The water base is made with studs-not-on-top connections which adds a bit of visual weight to this microscale build.

Making Primo builds from the most unlikely components [Building Techniques]

From Galidor to Clikits, LEGO has released products over the years that defy use in standard models due to a lack of connection points, unconventional materials, or bespoke colors. While most builders ignore these misfit toys, some, like Nathan Don (Woomy World) take it as a challenge to make even the most oddball LEGO piece shine. Case in point, this Hard-shelled Hen, which is an unusually large creation for using only 96 parts. That head? It comes from LEGO’s Primo line for the littlest “builders.” The beast’s shell is an upscaled hard hat, another pre-school toy never intended for actual construction. The neck and legs are DUPLO tubes, which we’ve definitely seen in some sophisticated MOCs lately. Only two studs are visible in this most unLEGOlike creation on the red arch around the neck. So how does this beast come together? As Nathan shares on his blog, there’s a skeleton of ball joints, Technic axles, flex tubes, and Vidyo straps, with rubber tires for fiction. When life give’s you LEGO hen’s teeth, make a hen monstrosity!

This spectactular Snoopy is a matter of perspective [Building Techniques]

Good grief, that’s some Nice Parts Usage! In this tiny build, Ian Summers captures the silhouette of beloved Peanuts pooch Snoopy in just 8 elements through the perfect mix of parts and clever use of perspective. Two of those parts are hats – a white baseball cap for the belly and a black cap for an ear – and for Snoopy’s muzzle and nose, I spy a Mixels eye. Pal Woodstock is unmistakable from just two tiny yellow elements. By framing the pieces from just the right angle, Ian gets the most from every piece in matching the shapes of the comic strip inspirations.

Ian’s builds are, as his handle suggests, bricktacular. A member of LEGO Ideas’ 10K club, Ian’s Jumanji board is currently under review to become an official set and probably won’t unleash rhinos in your living room.

Taking LEGO lights to the next level

With all the talented LEGO builders out there, cool techniques are constantly showing up in our feeds. However, it’s not every day that I’m so intrigued that I bookmark the page. Thanks to Joost van Velzen (MejoliDesign), I have a new trick I have to try! This ship is nice by itself, complete with moving landing gear and ramp, but the real head-turner is the use of 2×3 light bricks and a little bit of centrifugal force. Read on to see how!

Click to see how this awesome technique is achieved!

Celebrate Fabuland with your own Maid of Fabuland microscale steamboat [Instructions]

Are you a Fabuland fan but won’t be able to make the trip to Billund for the official LEGO tribute set? Or perhaps you love steamboats but are scared by the price tag on the upcoming Ideas set? Or maybe you just love cute things and walruses! In any case, Fabuland’s biggest “Fabufan,” and all around nice human Stewart Lamb Cromer has you covered with free instructions for a microscale version of the Maid of Fabuland paddle steamer that he built for display at LEGO House.

Here’s Stewart posing with the full-size version at LEGO House. Stewart talks about the build journey and his challenges with losing sight in one eye in a moving account on his blog.

Building trees with minifig antlers, Pt. 1: Microscale [Feature]

Ever since LEGO released Reindeer Fan with a new head accessory, I’ve been wondering when we’d see element 6440443 antlers used as foliage in a LEGO set considering how closely it resembles oak leaves. The Fountain Garden set released in January contains a single use of the leaf, but in white. Inspired by this lush tree from Ryan McBride, and not seeing many uses of the part in MOCs, I decided to do some experiments myself. But first I needed to source more leaves. Fortunatey I had just the Forestmen for the job…

Read on to learn how to make microscale trees with antlers

Fabulous Final Fantasy Carriage and build your own chocobo [Instructions]

If there’s one thing you can count on with a Final Fantasy game, even more than chocobos, moogles, or a mechanic named Cid, it’s the inevitable remake. In that spirit, Kevin Wanner, the Brick Ninja, revisits an earlier build with an all-new LEGO recreation of a beloved Final Fantasy VII scene. It’s impressive to see how the builder has grown in the intervening years. The chocobo looks fluffier than ever with a rounder aesthetic, and the terrain goes from afterthought to an immersive scene with integrated lighting. The main attraction is the carriage itself, which Kevin redesisgned from the ground up. Expanded to 8 studs wide, the carriage is now proportional and screen accurate and features an interior space for Tifa to make her under-cover trip to Don Corneo’s.

But about that chocobo, if you’re interested in building your own, click on the poster below for Kevin’s free instructions.

Celebrate some NPU with a LEGO creation you can almost hear [Building Techniques]

Sometimes it’s the simplest things that are the most satisfying. Take this brilliant use of a white LEGO plant stem to denote champagne spray, for example. All in all, it’s a simple build and a simple composition but Erin Dempsey piece is so effective, you can pretty much hear the champagne cork pop. Sparkles behind the creation adds an unmistakable festive atmosphere. Sometimes, like in the case of this Nice Parts Usage (NPU), you got to find a reason to celebrate in your own way. Cheers!

LEGO doodling – following unusual parts wherever they lead [Building Techniques]

Some LEGO builds are born from a clear vision of the final model. Others are more like doodles where you improvise as you go, finding joy in the parts you use along the way. Pan Noda provides little context for this latest bizarro creation, “Trioffic Lights,” but I’m guessing it falls in the doodle camp, an extension of the builder’s rescent fascination with DUPLO tubes. Aside from the star elements, DUPLO balls with faces, Pan Noda pulls in a mix of pleasing parts and techniques, like tank treads to wrap the faces, inverted rubber tires for the joints, corner window visors, Aquazone octagonal legs, and Belville perfume bottle fingers. Despite such an ecclectic set of elements, the build keeps coherent by sticking to the three primary colors. The results walk a fine line between nightmare and whimsy, a liminal space Pan Noda is qutie familiar with.

What’s the strangest place your LEGO doodling has taken you?