Category Archives: Feature

The Brothers Brick is not just about showcasing the best fan builds and bringing you the latest LEGO News, we also love to investigate, interview and discuss! These featured articles are all interesting articles that you can look back and enjoy reading.

Returning to Medina Al Musawrah – the massive Middle Eastern city collab from LEGO legends

Last year, 10 builders came together to build a fictional city inspired by cities of the Middle East and North Africa called “Medina Al Musawrah.” It was one of TBB’s favorite LEGO projects of last year, and you can read our interview with the organizers of this remarkable collaboration here. At last month’s BrickFair NoVa, a year of planning with triple the number of collaborators came to fruition as Medina Al Musawrah made its return, bigger and more spectacular than ever.

While the collaborators based elements of the build on different specific locations from personal travel or research, the city like a Pakastani transport truck and La Pyramid hotel from Ivory Coast. As Michael said in our interview, “It’s Cairo, Damascus, Baghdad, Jerusalem, Casablanca, Beirut, Istanbul. It’s anywhere at any time.”

Our tour of the Medinah continues

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Vignweek Day 2: Color us impressed with these monochrome creations [Feature]

Vignweek is an annual competition hosted by RebelLUG that challenges builders to assemble a vignette around a daily theme. Just 24 hours to turn around a build with no rest days! It’s a marathon and a sprint for some incredibly talented LEGO creators. We rounded up our favorites from day 1’s “Archaeology” theme here. For day 2, the theme is “Monochrome,” challenging builders to make a vignette using just one LEGO color. Here’s just a sampling of the amazing creativity born from this challenging constraint.

Jakub Kozina gets his greebling on with a tribute to the knobby little bits that space and machine builders so adore. Excellent glue and modeling scissors too!

Sydrarian offers a microscale scene of a tower in the clouds. There are so many impressive curves in this lovely composition. The builder also gets a bonus color through use of negative space to give the tower windows that pop.

NikiFilik‘s creation may be red, but I’m feeling green with envy at the skillful technique on display.

More monochrome creations await

Digging up some awesome LEGO vignettes as Vignweek 2025 kicks off [Feature]

Vignweek is an annual competition hosted by RebelLUG that challenges builders to assemble a vignette around a daily theme. 5 weekday builds and a weekend build, for a total of 6 builds in 7 days. It’s a marathon and a sprint for some incredibly talented LEGO creators. The contest kicked off on Monday with “Archaeology” as the theme. Here are some of our favorite creations from day 1.

Carson Lacy zooms in with Johnny Thunder exploring a lush jungle site. I hesitate to call them “ruins” as this location seems as slick and studless as they day it was built. It’s probably cursed, but this beautiful build certainly isn’t!

Behold_The_Loaf offers up an alien archaeologist scanning a future Earth. What do they make of this Octan fueling station?

Join us as we dig up more amazing LEGO vignettes

Beyond the spider-verse – these creepy fantasy minifigs and creature builds will catch you in their web [Minifig Monday]

LEGO will soon be venturing into the Marvel Spider-verse for the next line of Collectible Minifigs, but you don’t need to wait until August to find weird and wonderful fig creations of the arachnid (and arachnid adjacent) variety. Today on Minifig Monday we’re catching a bevy of bug and spider flavored figs and mini builds in our web!

Kicking off this week’s lineup is The Seamstress by Brennan (brickbot_studio). Animation fans might recognize this wicked weaver from the film the post-apoc “stitch-punk” film 9. Brennan has made some incredible mini character builds but this might be my favorite thing he’s ever shared. Excellent use of the Samukai minifig head from Ninjago.

Keeping to the spinstress theme, we have the Song Weaver by Aris (bricks.for_bricks). This arachnid character brings an aristocratic air to the spider theme, with One Ring bangles and an impressive headress mixing cloth, plastic feathers, and rubber bands.

Eight limbs? Ha! This Friendly centipede from Dicken Liu has arms to spare! Who would have guessed that minidoll toros make such grotesquely perfect bug segments? I haven’t been able to unsee this amazing creation since Dicken shared it a few months back, and if it’s new to you, you’re welcome.

the creepy creations continue after the fold

LEGO reveals two new NIKE sets, further blurring the line between play and advertising [Editorial]

The line between toy and advertisement has long been blurry. From Howdy Doody to He-Man to Paw Patrol, children’s programming is often a thinly veiled commercial for products. Over the past few decades, fandom has morphed from a community-driven passion into corporate cultivation and exploitation of IP. Now fandom has evolved from selling products to selling a “lifestyle,” something you can see in LEGO’s growing focus on display over play.

There are few brands that understand how to sell a lifestyle as well as Nike, which makes LEGO’s partnership with the athletic company a perfect match for this moment. With one product on their shelf, a young person can express both their creative spirit and their drive for athletic performance. It’s a no-compromise explosion of excellence for ages 10+.

Click to read our full thoughts on the new NIKE set reveals

Learn how to master Brick-Bult Water with this free LEGO ebook from Exe Sandbox [Feature]

When it comes to water-building, there are plenty of examples from official LEGO sets that can be adapted for your custom models, but sometimes you want to push your LEGO creations beyond basic designs. Tong Xin Jun (Exe Sandbox) has created an extensive guide full of tips and tricks for creating LEGO water from bricks and is offering it as a free ebook: Brick-Built Water. The builder graciously offered to let us host a copy of the ebook so that others can learn from this essential resource.

For a preview of the free ebook, click here

Now this is Pod Racing! The most wizard LEGO Pod Racers in the galaxy [Feature]

Whatever your feelings about Star Wars Episode I’s convoluted plot, clunky dialogue, and over-reliance on slapstick, when the Boonta Eve Classic kicks off, the movie soars. Podracers – typically a small cockpit yoked to massive engines – are an homage to chariot racing, Formula 1, and muscle cars. The simple formula has proven a perfect platform for creativity among LEGO builders over the years. Today we’re rounding up some recent builds featuring incredible podracers from some of our favorite builders (including a trio of LEGO set designers!)

Earlier this summer, brickbot_studio hosted a podracing contest and the resulting builds are truily inspiring. rebel.p.u.n.k‘s entry is a favorite for the clean engine designs and little details like the cloud of dust as the stabilizer fin grazes the gound.

Zakar.ion‘s entry doubles down on greebling. Surfboards and skis look great on the engines. I’m not sure if I trust that pilot, though. Somebody call the Space Police!

Check out the rest of the podracers after the fold

Minifig Monday: These golden K-Pop Demon Hunter LEGO creations are sweet as soda pop [Feature]

The surprise hit of the summer, with its eye-catching animation and a soundtrack of earworms, is K-Pop Demon Hunters from Netflix and Sony Animation. It has a LEGO connection, as the film’s creator, Maggie Kang, was also head of story for the Ninjago movie. This week on Minifig Monday we round up some creative LEGO takes on the demon-slaying pop idols of Huntr/x and their rivals, the Saja Boys, along with instructions to build your own adorable Derpy the Tiger.

Markus (@Bricks of Maze) gets us started with half-demon Rumi with a minifig-scale build of Derpy. The shadow raven from Elves makes a fitting appearance in the hat that it stole from Derpy.

Natashia (@_motherofcatdragons_) mashes up the idol band with Star Wars for a Jedi take on Huntr/x.

In this reimagined universe, Huntr/x walks the path of the Jedi — seekers of balance, guided by the Force yet never losing the edge that defines the hunt. With lightsabers in hand and instincts sharper than any blade, this is what it looks like when rhythm meets destiny in a galaxy far, far away.

It’s no wonder they’re climbing up the galactic pop charts. Watch out, Sy Snoodles!

Oh-no! Someone is running off with the band’s manager, BB-Y! This could only be the work of…

More sweet as soda pop creations follow

LEGO Creator 3-in-1 31167 Haunted Mansion: Ghosts, graveyards, and ghoulish monsters [Review]

With its sand green coloring, assortment of ghosts and ghouls and boarded-up windows, LEGO Creator 3-in-1 31167 Haunted Mansion immediately evokes the spirit of the 10228 Monster Fighters Haunted House from 2012 – a fondly-remembered set from a much-loved theme. But does it measure up? Is it truly its spiritual successor? (See what I did there?) Read on to learn what we think. This new scary house has 736 pieces and will retail for US $89.99 | CAN $119.99 | UK £79.99 when it releases this August 1st.

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.

Let’s haunt this old dive and see what spirits we can dig up!

LEGO Creator 3-in-1 31168 Medieval Horse Knight Castle: A kingdom of versatility [Review]

With 1371 pieces, 31168 Medieval Horse Knight Castle is the flagship of the Creator 3-in-1 line this year. Packed with play features in any configuration, and sporting a new Castle Faction – the Horse Knights – there’s a lot to enjoy. But how does it stack up compared to castles of yore? Let’s put this latest LEGO castle through its paces before it’s debut on August 1st, when you can bring it home for $129.99, US $149.99 CA, £109.99 UK.

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

Read the full review

Zen and the art of building LEGO Castles with Cathedral of Bricks [Interview]

There’s no time like the present to find your creative voice with LEGO. Today’s guest is another builder who only recently began sharing their works online and already they are making quite a splash with fellow AFOLs. Luke, aka cathedralofbricks, creates castles and vignettes that blend gothic architecture and fantasy through a romantic lens.

Over just a few months, Luke has created an impressive body of MOCs. We’re excited to sit down with Luke to learn more about how he found his creative voice in LEGO as someone coming to the hobby later in life.

Our interview with cathedralofbricks follows, along with a gallery of the builder’s incredible castle creations

Engineering for excellence – the Star Wars builds of Jürgen Wittner [Interview]

Today we’re joined by fan designer Jürgen Wittner, whose incredible Star Wars vehicles, built at 1:16 scale, are masterworks of LEGO engineering. We talk about his latest project, the Fall of Hoth, creative collaboration, and the process for designing and sharing these premium builds.

TBB: Hi, Jürgen. It’s been some time since the Brothers Brick checked in with you, but you’ve been quite busy. Maybe we can start by talking a bit about your latest build, the Fall of Hoth. I saw the illustration by Laurie Greasley and the 3D model by Jeff Lu. What inspired you to continue adapting this image into LEGO? Did you coordinate with either of the other artists?

Our interview with master fan designer Jürgen Wittner follows…