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.

Woodlouse-bots, roll out!

Woodlice are terrestrial isopods and, among other nicknames, are affectionately known as “roly-poly pill bugs” for their ability to roll into a ball. Though this ability is a natural defense mechanism, Japanese builder Moko drew inspiration from the woodlouse for their latest LEGO mech. Moko’s mech emulates the woodlouse’s segmented body thanks to staggered round shell detail elements, which appeared in black in 2012 Hero Factory sets Black Phantom and Toxic Reapa. This black armor is also reminiscent of the crab-like Garthim from The Dark Crystal.

As an added bonus, Moko’s woodlouse mech rolls into a ball just like the real thing. While the real life woodlouse does this to protect itself, I think it’s safe to say this mechanical critter can also use it for quick getaways. Now, that’s using your exoskeleton!

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The Good, the Bad and the Mandalorian

The first season of the Mandalorian has now finished on Disney+ and while we have some time to wait before season 2, we can still revel in the LEGO creations inspired by the show. The planet Nevarro makes a few appearances, and First Order LEGO has recreated one pivotal scene. The landscape is sufficiently textured to give the model the same gritty feeling as the show. Additionally, the buildings are built using many small pieces, making them as aged and weathered as we’ve come to expect from the Star Wars galaxy. To avoid getting too spoilery, I’ll just say that the scene is filled with all the right details, from droids to moisture vaporators, that make it unmistakably Star Wars. Check out the rest of this builder’s photos and see what other details you can spot.

To the stars and beyond: my microscale LEGO spacecraft inspired by NASA – part 1

As a longtime LEGO space builder, I found I was ready for a bit of a change. After years of building Star Wars and video-game inspired spaceships, I wanted to try my hand at building a spaceship that is, paradoxically, a little more down to earth. Rather than ships bristling with big guns or outfitted with wings, I decided to take my visual cues from movies like Interstellar, The Martian, and of course, NASA’s own designs. Several years ago I built the space shuttle launch system for the theme, and since then I’ve been working on a couple of spacecraft. I’ve displayed them at a number of conventions, but over the holidays this year, I finally polished them up and photographed them. The first ship I built was the Vanguard, part of the fictional Interplanetary Expedition Alliance, mankind’s first attempt at visiting nearby planets and their orbiting bodies.

I built it as a series of discrete modules, and then strung the modules together to create the larger spacecraft. I like this technique because it lets me play with small structures of a few dozen elements at a time, which also results in a look similar to the real International Space Station’s modular design. Continue reading →

A midnight snack and a dip in the pool sounds good right about now.

The premise of Gremlins was to never expose these adorable Mogwai to bright light, never get them wet and never, ever feed them after midnight. But how do they know what time zone they’re in? Plus it’s always midnight somewhere so did they take that into consideration? They broke the rules anyway and drama ensued but in the 80’s you didn’t really need cohesive plots to make a movie watchable. All you needed was Phoebe Cates. Grantmasters proves you don’t need a ton of LEGO to recreate a pretty convincing facsimile of Gizmo, the adorable star of Gremlins who wasn’t Phoebe Cates.

This huge LEGO microscale city continues to grow

When we last checked in with Christophe Pujaletplaa almost a year ago, he’d just finished adding roads to the microscale LEGO city he calls Microville. It’s now grown to more than 11 meters squared, or close to 100 large 48×48-stud baseplates and gained a waterfront.

Christophe has been continuously working on the city since 2010, slowly adding more streets with detailed buildings, along with the occasional larger upgrade. The waterfront section adds new beach real estate and an industrial port next to the airport. Continue reading →

Check out the toothy grin on this LEGO bot

Sometimes you see a LEGO part and you think “now what will I ever do with that?” I’ve always loved the greebly, mechanical look of the ripcord housing element, but for the life of me I’ve never found a use for it. That’s not a problem for Cezium, though, who whipped together this brilliant digital model with two whole rows of them for the teeth–er, excuse me, railgun housings on this sentry bot. This just goes to prove that old LEGO building axiom: all pieces are useful if you have a sufficient quantity of them.

Go down memory lane with these amazing LEGO versions of classic Transformers

Alex “Orion Pax” Jones is a very focussed builder. All his LEGO building time lately has been spent on creating as-accurate-as-they-can-be digital Transformers Generation 1 characters. There’s so much to love about these as they instantly transport us back to a time when morning cartoons were not streamed and you had to wake up early to tune in to what now are amazing pop culture classics.

Click to see more Generation 1 Transformers

From a certain point of view, Jedi are bullies of the galaxy

Let’s look at it this way: Stormtroopers always miss their shots and Jedi constantly use their Force push capabilities to render those poor troopers in weak plastic white armour lifeless. Letranger Absurde shows off this exact scenario taking place in (almost) real-time with an unarmed Stormtrooper. That red light saber, says a lot, doesn’t it? Hint: EVIL! The character build is stunningly simple yet gives off a maximum punch with the pose giving off a dynamic in-motion feel.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...

This holiday season, Star Wars fans are flocking to movie theaters to see the final installment in the Skywalker saga. Since Star Wars came out in 1977, we’ve grown older, some of us have had kids of our own, some have bought homes, held more than a few jobs, some of us may even be looking as old and grizzled as Luke Skywalker himself. No matter how we turned out in life, Star Wars fans who were children or young adults in 1977 recall the year that changed their lives immesuably. An entity named NS Brick Designs has sparked a sense of wonder and nostalgia for older Star Wars fans with a LEGO rendition of the original Tom Jung pulp poster that started it all.

Luke’s robe billows open revealing his massively muscled chest while a subservient, sultry Leia slinks at his feet holding a blaster. This wasn’t the reality of the movie; Luke wasn’t all that ripped and it turns out Princess Leia could hold her own and wasn’t going to play second fiddle to a farm boy from Tatooine. But pulp images, especially this one inspired by the fantasy art of Frank Frazetta, have a way of capturing the imagination and bending perceptions a bit. Now in modern times, we are calling the newest movie the last of the Skywalker saga, but we have new heroes to look up to such as Finn, Rey and Poe. Thanks to a dedicated fan base and thanks, in part, to images like this one, the magic and lore of Star Wars has persisted with us most of our lives and will likely remain with us for generations to come.

Showdown with the Mandalorian

Do not self destruct! This diorama featuring the climactic battle from Chapter 1 of The Mandalorian deserves never to be taken apart. “Outpost on Arvala-7” is built by none other than KevFett2011 — one of the most accomplished LEGO builders in the world, who has returned with this stunning model of The Mandalorian and IG-11 closing in on their bounty.

In a way, this build is incredibly simple: There are only four colors used in the hut, well and landscape. Deciding what color palette to use in a highly-detailed scene can be frustrating, but here KevFett utilizes the saying “less is more”.

Another aspect of the build that I like is the roughness of everything. There are hardly any smooth surfaces, which makes sense on a harsh desert world like Arvala-7. Slopes, studs, and angular pieces help illustrate the idea that the pair of bounty hunters are not welcome here, and that they’ll have to fight their way to their goal.

Not your usual Star Wars build

Lately, between The Mandalorian and The Rise of Skywalker, the LEGO building community has seen a great wealth of fan creations based on all things Star Wars. This is not, in itself, a bad thing. I mean, Baby Yoda is indeed very cute. But it’s still nice when a builder will take things in a very unexpected direction. Let’s say you have a 75117 Kylo Ren set on hand. Sure, you could build it according to the directions and act out your favorite Dark Side moments. But Letranger Absurde decided to take those parts and present a very different Dark Side vision. The Blood Countess takes key parts from that set and turns them into a vision of malice that is, to me anyway, just a bit scarier.

The most obvious part is Kylo’s torso, inverted and used for the Countess’ abdomen. Less easy to identify are the shoulder guards now forming her bodice. Of the non-kit parts in use, I like the Ninjago influence in the hat for the belt buckle and spinner ring in the sash detailing. Beyond the Countess herself, check out the build on the heart (or other glob of flesh) in her hand. There’s a telephone receiver in there. Is the secret message of this build “reach out and touch someone?” Gosh, I hope not.

Build and own the Tesla Cybertruck right now [Instructions]

Why wait for Elon Musk to release the Cybertruck when you can own your very own right now? No deposit required! We know it’s not going to have the autopilot feature, but it’s not really going to be a big deal-breaker here thanks to Hachiroku24. If it comes apart in any unfortunate accidents, it’s going to be 100% rebuildable right back to the condition that it came in. How does that work?

Click to see full video instructions