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.

The board game Azul comes to life in LEGO

Toltomeja and I share not one, but two hobbies. We both love playing board games. Toltomeja’s favorite game is Azul, a game which I play quite often myself. Their rendition of the game in LEGO bricks is instantly recognizable. Even if you are not familiar with the game you can still appreciate this creation for what it is, an amazing build with lots of interesting building techniques and a very pleasing aesthetic. They even managed to improve the game board by adding insert slots for the little game cubes. To top it all off they even built the table on which the game board is resting, complete with wood grain and everything.

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.

The Secret of the Sphinx

Johnny Thunder is a theme that always had my interest. He was LEGO’s Indiana Jones before they started producing licensed sets. Johnny has seen it all. From Egypt to the jungle straight to Dino Island. He even went on an Orient Expedition. Ruben Ras shows us an update for LEGO set Sphinx Secret Surprise. Ruben’s rendition of this set is instantly recognizable. Everything is there! The Sphinx, the tent, the desert car, and the obelisk covered in brick-built (!) hieroglyphs. As if that were not enough he even swapped the raised base plate for a brick-built base. Of course, this ‘set’ comes with all the main characters: Baron von Barron, Dr. Charles Lightning, Johnny Thunder, Lord Sam Sinister, Miss Gail Storm, Pharaoh Hotep, and a skeleton mummy. Every single character got an update. The best thing about this has to be that not a single sticker was used.

It’s spring, springtime again

This past spring was pretty memorable, to say the least, but here’s to a more hopeful beginning. So what better way to celebrate the incoming season than a floral LEGO build that won’t cause a fit of pollen allergies? There’s much to love about the House of Flowers Konoyaro, from its striking dark red brickwork to its smaller details, like the Unikitty lupines. And aside from the Tudor-esque jettied and structural walls, the house is virtually void of 1x bricks. Instead, Konoyaro has opted for a variety of plate techniques, most notably stacked at the corners for a meticulous brick texture effect. You can also find more plates staggered at the base of the small bay window and surprisingly, in the loosely sculpted trees upfront. But my favorite detail by far is the brick-built front door. It’s a classy alternative to prefabricated doors that I’ll be taking note of for future inspiration.

We’re no stranger to Konoyaro’s vibrant and textural brick building style. Dive into our archives to find their Little Mermaid build we’ve featured this past September!

Cantinas come in all sizes

Not everyone has the money or space needed to acquire the newest Cantina set, but that didn’t stop ron_mcphatty from applying the magic microscale treatment to this iconic location that was once referred to as a wretched hive of scum and villainy. The scene includes all vehicles and other details as the official set, including both moister evaporators, Greedo’s ship, and even has Luke’s speeder.

Not only does this model capture many of the details that make it’s larger inspiration such a fantastic model, it even opens up just like it.

Space themes on wheels

Generally, when one thinks about yore’s classic space themes, big spaceship builds come to mind and occasionally a tiny rover. The G Brix gives us something different – a very large LEGO rover which can be flipped over, each side with its own aesthetic, depending on your mood it can be Blacktron or the Space Police.

The space police portion of the build uses vibrant translucent red elements, including the cockpit, and brilliant blue elements such as tiles and wing pieces. Of course, there are some distinguishing printed “police” tiles and slopes.

Now flip the build over and you get a very cool blacktron build complete in the black and yellow color scheme. Signature elements also included here are the yellow trans-clear cockpit and the printed slope with the blacktron logo.

This vehicle is a model and an RC car as well that can be controlled through an app. Overall it is an awesome build for any fan of classic space themes villainous or heroic.

Maybe a Jedi, but not a mechanic

Season two of the Disney+ streaming series The Mandalorian presses on, and in episode four, a very toasted Razor Crest starship makes its way through space as Din Djarin continues on in his quest to reunite the child with his kind. Mihal builds a humorous scene out of LEGO from this episode of the child who is small enough to fit into some crevices and able to get to some electronics necessary for repair, unfortunately, this type of work may not be the child’s calling.

The build for the child here actually looks like a miniature version of the buildable child with his legs and torso being largely brick-built; it looks like many small plates and tiles in tan were utilized for this portion. The child’s head consists of slopes and bricks in sand green, his eyes being the same ones used in the dewback build from the 2019 Escape Pod vs. Dewback micro-fighters set. This built scene is not only expertly executed but also makes great use of wire-like elements and other small pieces like the lightsaber hilts. As always, I cannot wait to see more builds inspired by the show.

The changing faces of NYC taxis

The image that pops into my mind when I think of New York City is one of urban canyons full of yellow taxis. For decades, taxis in the city that never sleeps were large sedans with big engines. In the last ten years or so, things have been changing, though. NYC taxis are still yellow, but most are now hybrids. And most are made by Toyota, rather than by American manufacturers such as Checker, Chevrolet or Ford.

The Checker Marathon is the classic New York taxi from the sixties and seventies. It was a traditional sedan, with a heavy-duty cab-on-frame construction well-suited for New York’s famously pot-holed streets. Its design changed very little during the two decades that it was in production. It became a New York icon, comparable to London’s black cab or the Routemaster bus. Many movies and TV shows filmed in the Big Apple feature Checker cabs, including Taxi Driver and Ghostbusters, as well as the TV sitcoms Taxi and Friends.
Continue reading →

Absolutely Riddikulus!

Ekjohnson1 shows us that even though LEGO did their best, a good figure can always be improved. The figure in the spotlight is the second edition of the Snape Boggart from the Harry Potter franchise. Although LEGO did a splendid job on creating this figure, it didn’t fully capture the description in the books:

“You will raise your wand — thus — and cry ‘Riddikulus’ — and concentrate hard on your grandmother’s clothes. If all goes well, Professor Boggart Snape will be forced into that vulture-topped hat, and that green dress, with that big red handbag.”

The builder has added the green dress and topped the hat off with a crow, formerly of the Scarecrow CMF. Placing said figure in a well lit diorama complete with a brick built wardrobe and a quite easy yet effective chandelier using the knob wheel and some small flames, makes for one stellar shot.

That’s when an evil woman trapped him on the dark side of the moon

The Brothers Brick contributor Chris Doyle once again builds something based on Mystery Science Theater 3000. What’s his excuse this time?

One of my favorite escapes from reality is Mystery Science Theater 3000. People riffing on bad movies just makes the world seem less bleak, somehow. The best part, though, is that my wife Jennifer is also a big fan. She’s usually more of a “build a LEGO set” person than a “make something new out of LEGO” person, but I was able to tempt her into collaborating on a LEGO Art style mosaic of the latest MST3k head-honcho: Kinga Forrester. (As portrayed by a Felicia Day.)

The techniques we used were very similar to the ones I helped develop for my Wonder Woman collaboration. We bought a couple of LEGO art sets (Beatles and Warhol this time.) We used the LEGO Art Remix site to create several prototype images. We threw away our first few attempts, and combined at least three different versions of instructions for the final image. And then hand-built all the fine details anyway.
Continue reading →

Your favorite desk-mates

I recently finished watching the popular television series The Office, therefore any office supply or item reminds me of the show, this LEGO build of some desk essentials by Joffre Zheng included.

The brick-built models include a grey stapler, a classic #2 pencil, and an eraser. All three builds are composed of bricks with heavy use of tiling and slopes to cover studs and smooth things out. Judging by the grey round 4×4 brick with technic pin holes piece used at the top of the pencil to render the metal eraser binding, these builds are pretty large in scale, much larger than the actual real life objects. If office supplies are your thing, or you’re just missing the workplace or school, then this build is definitely for you!

It’s beginning to look a bit like Christmas in a galaxy far, far away

We have seen quite a few builders pay tribute to the Empire’s most fearsome walking tank, the AT-AT. But I think this is the most unusual version I’ve seen in quite a while. Simon Liu has stretched his LEGO creativity to new heights with this stilt-legged AT-AT tasked with delivering Christmas trees to all corners of the galaxy.

The Bug Knight won’t let the bedbugs bite. Or maybe he will.

Sometimes you just really get a kick out of something. Maybe it’s the big black radar dishes for eyes, or maybe it’s a clever use of balloon segment parts, but I just love this LEGO Bug Knight built by Nathan Hake. He tells us the Hollow Knight game loosely inspires this. Having never played, I’ll just have to take his word for it. That doesn’t stop me from loving it, though. I’m attracted to it like a moth to a flame, which, now that I think about it will likely end in the same result; singed proboscis. This might be the best thing I’ve seen all day, and I’ve seen someone try to gas up a Tesla!