Category Archives: Models

This is what we’re all about. We scour the web for the best custom LEGO models to share with you. From castles and spaceships to planes, trains, and automobiles, you’ll find the best LEGO creations from builders all over the world right here on The Brothers Brick.

LEGO Palico and feathered mount are ready to help you hunt monsters

Capcom’s Monster Hunter games have gone from niche to mega popular, so it’s high time we see some of the incredible creature designs get the LEGO treatment. Thankfully Mitch Phillips answers the call, not only nailing ornate feathers and fur from LEGO elements but sharing the process so we can train up to capture our own monsters in bricks. For the feathered mount, Mitch draws on leaves, flippers, chima wings, and so many other clever parts. Kudos to Mitch for spotlighting the technique used on the neck feathers that was learned from character-building legend Jayfa. Even though it’s a simpler build, I’m smitten by the ~~kitten~~ Palico companion.

For a breakdown of how the creatures were built, and tips on building complex and colorful characters that draw on LEGO’s broad range of parts, I can’t recommend Mitch’s video stream enough.

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DeRa celebrates Kitano Ijinkan-gai landmark Weathercock House with LEGO modular masterpiece

Japanese builder DeRa has created some of the most spectacular MOCs of recent years, such as this entrancing LEGO tiger and brick-built Godzilla. But while mecha and monsters have been the builder’s calling card, DeRa’s academic focus as a university student is architecture. For their latest build, DeRa brings an AFOL’s perspective to the iconic Weathercock House from Kobe Japan’s Kitano Ijinkan-gai, a neighborhood where foreign residents created magnificent manors of Western design in the early 20th century.

Sticking to LEGO modular conventions, DeRa builds atop a 32×32 and 16×32 stud plate while allowing between 4-6 studs for sidewalk space. This pushes the build into stylized space, with both exterior and interior designed around minifig scale. But DeRa’s design holds another secret.

Like an ornate puzzle box, this modular slides apart into 12 separate modules!

Read on for details on the build process and pictures of the interior

Top marks for this bottom-feeder

From the depths of the imagination of LEGO builder Olle Moquist comes an aquatic ambulatory ecosystem that includes LEGO elements as diverse and obscure as the sea life itself.
Olle shares that some of their favourite creative corals “ended up being scrapped as they didn’t quite fit the palette”. I find this very relatable. I know from personal experience that sometimes during the creative process it can be hard to let go of a component (character, scene, phrase, LEGO part usage…?) that is precious to you as the creator but is no longer serving the creation itself.
Olle adds being “quite happy with the bioluminescent coral and the one with the mohawk hair”, both of which you can see in this view, but those who want to take a deeper dive will find dinosaur heads, “giant sausages“, and those janky little fender parts introduced in the short-lived Tiny Turbos theme all put to excellent use.
If this lovely build and all its clever parts usage is the result of creative compromise, I look forward to seeing what Olle has in store for us next!

Can the City Core MK-Rotomix fix it? Yes he can

The mark of a great character builder is the ability to look at an odd assortment of plastic parts and find personality. Redverse is one of the best, able to animate life into LEGO characters, whether they’re built from System bricks, Bionicle, or even a DUPLO assist. The inspiration for this construction bot was the DUPLO Bob the Builder Dizzy face in orange, along with Dizzy’s drums as arms. From there, orange wheels and slopes fill out the primary color, with Redverse adding black and white accents to match Dizzy’s eyes. The cloud of smoke is a puffy delight that offsets the somewhat menacing arm that I’m guessing sprays concrete, not bullets.

This robot is the bee’s knees

If you haven’t been following Shannon Sproule, you’ve been missing out on a plethora of delightfully quirky robot builds. Case in point, this Hadal Wanderer minibot that trudges a vast, endless abyss for signs of life. But we don’t have to look too hard for signs of Shannon’s personality, as this build is full of them. From the horse rein eyebrows to the bee hive legs, Shannon always finds unique ways to incorporate the kinds of pieces you might not immediately associate with robotics. For more of Shannon’s special take on sci-fi, check out our archives.

Have you ever wanted to hug a brick so much in your life?

We all know you can build anything out of LEGO, but the builds we feature do trend towards certain repeated themes; spaceships, mountain sides, sports cars, robots… In other words, hard, solid stuff. That’s why this teddy bear by Simon Küntzel delights us so much. We know it’s not soft. We know it’s a solid chunk of hard plastic. It weighs more than 13 and a half pounds. But, gosh, does it look soft and huggable. Simon has perfectly captured the curves of a plush toy. And it’s no wonder, as Simon devoted 200 hours to the construction.

Delight at these dashing dachshunds

We just took a look at some stellar spaceships from Ted Andes, but that not all he’s been building lately, and the subjects are so polar opposite it felt right to highlight his work again. In a re-work of a previous build, Ted has made his horse racing derby run smaller. And in perfect form for a smaller build, he’s replaced the horses with adorable tiny dachshunds.

If you were at Brickworld Chicago, you might have had a chance to see these hounds race in person. But, if not, check out the video below!

Dummies that pass the test

If you were born this century, you may not have much reference for a crash test dummy, but Ben Brickson brings these icons into the 21st Century with brothers Crash and Smash.These builds are loaded with articulation thanks to 20 ball joints per dummy. And that means that, even without faces, we’re able to see a high degree of emotion and connection between the brothers, thanks to their body language.

Some superb posing puts Crash right in line with the famous stature, The Thinker.

And a handshake shows the full level of trust between weary brothers of a dangerous trade.

A pair of spaceships as different as night and day

In a flurry of building on the way to Chicago’s Brickworld, Ted Andes delivered a number of great builds to admire. Let’s start with one of Ted’s signature spaceship styles: small, compact, solid colors with straight lines. Here it comes in true Vic Viper form. And the working land gear are a bonus.

We next move to a spaceship made from a pool of parts often used by Ted: Hero Factory. The bubble cockpit surrounded by four blade-wings and exposed engines has a great mechanical feel to it, providing a great contrast to the build above.

Colour us impressed by this colourless LEGO diorama

Colour is an important facet of good LEGO builds. Yeah, that might sound like stating the obvious – a consistent palette will generally look nicer than a mish-mash of colours. But Syrdarian has graced us with a prime example. It’s a nice build to start with: some cool terrain shaping, and the top of the bridge wall mirrors the hammers used in the archway. But most noticeably, it’s all so drab! The grey background seems to have been chosen carefully for its resemblance to a grey winter sky. And even the figure is dressed in muted colours. The only relative bright spots are the tan reeds, and the figure’s skin, standing out against the harsh environment, and drawing us in as a result. A good build, but with great composition!

Let me hear your engines roar! No, wait, not like that...

Alt builds seem to be having a real resurgence lately. In case you’re not familiar, it simply involves taking a LEGO set, setting aside the instructions, and letting your imagination run wild. Sometimes, the result can be completely different to the original! Flickr builder R 194 has got their hands on 10330 McLaren MP4/4, turning a fossil fuel-powered race car into a bionic dinosaur! And since there some very nice printed elements in that set, this re-imagined dino has a distinctive racing feel to it. Even the Ayrton Senna minifigure gets involved with a nifty two-piece remote. RC dino-mech racing? Now that sounds rad!

Finding the unusual in everyday Japanese architecture

We’re used to seeing some weird and wonderful buildings from Pan Noda, from the quirky to the downright fantastical. So imagine my surprise when I found that their latest build is of a real house! This depicts a residence in Kitano Ijinkan – a historical district of Kobe, in Japan. Many of the buildings here are built with more non-Japanese flair than traditional influence. Pan’s build, though, is of their usual high standard!

This is the ‘Hilltop House’, which apparently used to serve as the Chinese Consulate, among other things. There are a pair of ‘komainu’ guardian lion statutes just inside the gates, and rumour has it that walking past them will lead to success in your love life. I don’t know if there’s any truth to that, but I do know that I love Pan’s LEGO recreation of these statues!

See more of Pan Noda’s haunting recreation of the Kobe Hilltop House