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.

Taking inspiration from the next generation of builders

It never ceases to amaze me how inventive kids are when it comes to LEGO building; what they lack in technical skill they make up for in unbridled imagination. Builder Mishima has been tapping into his son’s own amazing ideas: a LEGO shark mech is an ingenious concept in anyone’s book! What I love about the upgraded model is how it diligently sticks to the unusual colour blocking and asymmetric features of the original build; the final adaptation revelling in these design choices. Yet, as cool as Mishima’s reimagined version is, the intellectual property rights probably belong to his son.

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Let your fingers do the counting

If you blink or scroll a little too fast, you may just miss that these items are made of LEGO. Marco Gan reminisces about his younger days when his father did his daily ledger work using an abacus and a Chinese ledger. The writing on the ledger follows actual records he made. The beads of the abacus are built with, yes, you guessed it, LEGO tyres. The gold finishing gives it an authentic touch of antiquity, leaving us in awe about how much we’ve advanced since the days when these were the essential tools of a merchant. Of course, some older folks today still claim that they can calculate faster using an abacus than you can on a digital calculator…

Harvesting the ocean’s riches

In the year 2018, Aquasharks is not a word that would turn many heads apart from the occasional hardcore adult LEGO fan. For the younger crowd, Aquasharks is an underwater LEGO theme from the 90’s that had some imaginative set designs and play features like magnets (which, admittedly, were everywhere back then). As opposed to some other themes from the same years, this particular one doesn’t seem to get much love from the online LEGO community, but luckily Jonas Obermaier is here to give it five minutes of glory… perhaps this time we won’t forget about it again?

The build is technically a hardsuit, but the heavy use of minifig parts (the core of the top half is based on the Aquasharks SCUBA gear) blurs the line between a heavily modified minifig and a compact mecha. With the builder’s skills in minifig design, this is hardly surprising. All sorts of small colourful parts capture the motif of the Aquasharks prints, and with enough imagination, the dark blue minifig hand in the center of the torso could look like a shark symbol!

Patience for perfection with a precious part is priceless

Builder Bruce Lowell built a bust of Boba Fett using a technique he made popular known as the Lowell Sphere but left it unfinished 5 years ago. It was only now that he picked up the recent Boba Fett BrickHeadz which came with the 2×2 printed triangle pieces that it made sense to revisit the project. Sometimes you just need the right part to come along to inspire you to finish an outstanding build. The result speaks for itself with the instantly recognisable bounty hunter from a galaxy far far away.

F is for Ford fitted with a fantastic folding top

Pixeljunkie continues to delight with his series of LEGO cars. This time, he turned to the Brass Era with a tiny 1915 Ford Model T roadster pickup. The Model T was the car that made driving more accessible to the general public, and Pixeljunkie’s model is a sharp-looking replica that conceals an amazing feature.

The thing that makes his car especially impressive is the incorporation of a working folding top. A stop-motion video showcases how smooth this feature is.

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Just like his 1955 Chevrolet Bel Air, Pixeljunkie documents his Model T as if it were a restoration. Over the past few weeks, he has teased us with images leading up to the finished product. It all started with this group of mechanics carefully looking over a set of plans. Look carefully, and you’ll notice the one minifigure has a Ford tattoo on his arm. You might say it is a “FORDshadowing” of things to come!

Click to see the amazing photos documenting this car’s build in a brick-built mechanic’s shop

Walk softly and carry a large bomb

While the month-long informal building event known as Ma.Ktober that happens every October may be over, The Maschinen Krieger movement that is the inspiration never really stops. For those not familiar with the phenomenon, it started in the early 1980’s as a sci-fi series in a Japanese hobby magazine, and the creators, using off the shelf model kits for airplanes, tanks, and other vehicles, created surreal combinations of armored hard suits and vehicles with strong alien and insect-like aspects. Two-legged walkers like this creation by Marco Marozzi are a popular subject as well.

The tall spindly legs have a very industrial feel, complete with pistons to drive each footstep deep into the rubble covered ground. Multiple sensors and ominous canisters cover the head and body of this drone as it seeks out its prey, and that belly mounted contraption looks like it could ruin your day.

An enchanting destination for tiny pirates

Following up on his lovely micro version of the LEGO Pirates Skull Island set, Letranger Absurde (aka Vitroleum, aka Pacurar Andrei) is at it again. Here’s his take on 6278 Enchanted Island — and it’s a cracker. The landscaping is perfect, with tan curved and wedge plates peeking from beneath the green to suggest the curve of the beach. The textured rock parts are used well, the palm trees are excellent, and the red canoe is a nice touch. But the star of the show has to be that central rope bridge constructed from bucket handles. Lovely.

Futurama BrickHeadz: Bender is great

Last month Palixa and the Bricks brought us a fantastic take on Futurama’s supporting cast in the BrickHeadz style. This time around, again working with her husband, she’s completed a second wave of models, depicting the TV show’s main cast in the same exquisite fashion.

See more Futurama characters as BrickHeadz

Moving house – post-apocalypse style

Post-Apocalypse or “ApocaLEGO” is a LEGO building theme which can see more dull brown and grey creations than the most boilerplate of steampunk. Here’s a glorious exception to the rule by Rat Dude: an imaginative take on the genre which sees enterprising survivors build a moveable dwelling out of transport containers and a truck — like some mobile version of the stacks from Ready Player One. Revelling in its central idea, this model is gloriously detailed, festooned with every likely requirement of the wasteland warrior catered for — solar power, fresh water, air con, a vegetable garden, and even an outhouse for the effective disposal of waste!

This thing is well worth a closer look, and the builder has provided some imagery of various angles. Great attention to detail on the model — just look at all the little touches that have been crammed into it. This layer upon layer of detail has created an engaging model within a building theme that usually leaves me cold. I can’t imagine a better ride in which to tour our dystopian future.

Brickmania 1031 F-4C Phantom Supersonic Jet Interceptor custom LEGO kit [Review]

We’ve featured custom LEGO kits by Brickmania many times over the years, but Dan Siskind‘s small business has grown considerably since the last time we reviewed one of the company’s kits. Most notably, Dan himself is no longer the sole or even primary designer — great LEGO builders like Cody Osell now contribute many of the custom designs to the company’s products. While Dan is best known for tanks, Cody has designed most of Brickmania’s airplane models, including the F-4C Phantom II we’ll be reviewing today.

Read our hands-on review of the Brickmania F-4C Phantom custom LEGO kit

This vast LEGO space diorama is filled with amazing details and animated features

Sprawling across multiple base plates, this staggering LEGO sci-fi display is the brainchild of builder Marco den Besten. Taking inspiration from the Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun video game franchise, it depicts a bustling military complex and its numerous support vehicles, mech suits and space fighters. The glistening yellow, white and grey colour scheme, borrowed from a Nexo Knight shield, gives it a crisp and clean futuristic feel.

See more details and animated features of this huge LEGO space diorama

Score Internet points on a dull life

Framed in just the right way, any life can seem interesting on social media, as shown in a LEGO scene by Arnaud B. The build and shot are quite clever in this artistic social commentary, with the phone frame hiding the seams between grayscale “real life” and full color “Instagram-filtered life” perfectly.