When we last checked in with Tim Schwalfenberg, he’d just completed his massive LEGO diorama of The Last of Us. While considerably smaller, this crumbling statue of a horse and rider — both their heads knocked off ages ago — is no less atmospheric. Although Tim considers this a small build, it still feels like a monumental sculpture that evokes the glory of a long-gone era. The brown sign also adds an air of mystery — what does it mean? Is this in the distant past or a terrifying future?
The maths involved here are simple: (LEGO + T-Rex) * Mech = AWESOME. Mitsuru Nikaido knocks it out of the park with this amazing mechanical menace. The white cladding gives just enough structure and shaping to the model, whilst still leaving plenty of room for the greebly details to show through beneath. The restrained colour scheme works well, the dark grey mechanical gubbins offering sharp contrast to the panels. This could have been enhanced further with a different colour of backdrop for the photography, but that’s a small gripe at an otherwise excellent creation.
There’s so much good work on display in this model, but the highlight for me is the use of minifig chainsaw pieces for the jaws — simply perfect.
Tyler Sky has been thinking about Friends minidolls and the retired LEGO Exo-Force theme, and perhaps eating a little too much cheese before bed. “What if Exo-Force continued to evolve, and then got assimilated by Friends?” These six Exo-Friends were the result. The minidolls look very cute with their new hair styles even if some of their exosuits are rather more intimidating.
We have an eye-catching lime exosuit, loosely-based on the alternate build suggestion for 7712 Supernova. Those clawed toes look very flexible and give the impression this Exo-Friends character is not limited by gravity and can climb any obstacle.
It’s not often a small LEGO creation manages to look HEAVY, but takamichi irie‘s wonderful Styracosaur carries enough heft that you can imagine the ground shaking as it passes by. The use of bow plate curves across the build creates a real sense of muscles and sinews beneath the skin, and the colour choices are excellent — muted and natural-looking, but not bland. There’s good parts choice for the “beak” at the front of the mouth too.
I don’t care if Styracosaurus was a herbivore, and that those horns were probably for display rather than protection, I’m not getting within a hundred yards of this behemoth. Check out the close-up look and tell me you feel any different.
This neon netrunner by Carter Baldwin is one part nostalgic 80s racing video game (think Out Run), one part Blade Runner, and one part experiment in color theory. Mix that all up and you’ve got one sweet LEGO speed machine. While the speeder bike itself is quite good, what at really makes this build pop is the background. I love the glowing, misting water, the ombre-effect wall, the exposed beams, and that trans-blue palm tree.
French builder Anthony Séjourné has captured exactly how I imagine an architect’s office — drawers full of supplies, shelves with inspirational books, and a well-lit, comfortable work area in which to imagine the next great monument, home, or skyscraper. Given all that loose paper, though, I’m vaguely concerned about that black fan…
Anthony has built a substantial series of excellent LEGO furniture and accessories. The coffee machine on the rolling shelves looks ready to dispense some much-needed caffeine to keep the inspiration flowing.
Crossing the LEGO wasteland is deadly for the unprepared. But this little speeder-biking mouse by Adam Dodge looks ready for the long haul. His bike is sleek underneath all that clutter and he’s even packing a boom-box for road trip music. (A Horse with No Name anyone?)
Overall Adam’s build has a dusty, apocalyptic feel. However, the sparse pops of color and the adorable mouse head (It’s a custom Mouse Guard head) give his creation a lighthearted feeling too.
Windmills have been utilising the energy of the wind power to automate tasks such as water pumping of grain grinding since 500-900 A.D. in Persia. This LEGO windmill by Issac S was inspired by some of the windmills seen in the video game Skyrim and was built for the 2017 Brickstory contest in the Early Middle Age category. The textured stone base of the windmill contrasts nicely with the wood and lighter stone central section and inspired use of the upturned barrel is the cherry on top.
The model features working windmill blades and a grindstone that are simultaneously operated by a crank on the back of the windmill. Issac has shared a video of this feature in action.
If you want to read more about the landscaping and, in particular, the tree seen in the left hand corner of this build, Issac has shared a tutorial. Originally this technique was used by Joeri Riddler and Issac has unpacked the design to allow others to develop the technique.
Lu Sim brings the Titan FS-1041 from the Titanfall 2 single player campaign to life with LEGO bricks. In the game, the FS-1041 is a Vanguard-class Titan like the main protagonist BT-7274, but with an alternate color scheme. Lu Sim’s minifigure scale replica is full of great details in both spot-on paneling and small greeble bits, and a smart use of a Bionicle armor plate as the FS-1041’s eye/AI Core. In addition to accurate aesthetics, it is fully articulated, has two opening hatches for cockpit access, and can carry the massive and detailed Predator Cannon.
The Fire Department of the City of New York (FDNY) is the largest municipal fire department in the United States, but Engine 54 stands out within this huge fire department, and its firehouse is known the “Pride of Midtown”. Fifteen members of Engine 54, Ladder 4, Battalion 9 were killed while responding to the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001. sponki25 has built an accurate scale model of Engine 54, a 2014 Seagrave Attacker HD 2000/500 High Pressure Pumper that is only six studs wide but packs an incredible amount of detail within that small space.
There are plenty of brick-built details within the six-stud wide confines. The home-made stickers may not be to everyone’s taste, but you have to admire Sven’s attention to even the smallest detail. It is also touching that Sven has dedicated this particular build to the memory of Engine 54’s heroes.
Sven has a growing collection of FDNY apparatus that you can see in his FDNY album, including the FDNY Ambulance below. I simply had to share this image of his ambulance responding to a scene, Sven’s minifig scale Stryker stretcher is really an awesome little build.
LEGO Super Heroes sets have some of our most favorite minifigures of all times. And, of course, superheroes need epic surroundings for their epic brawls. But the buildings we get in official sets sometimes are not as big and detailed as we would like them to be. Gzu Bricks takes matters into his hands and upgrades the 76038 Attack on Avengers Tower set in the most adorable way — by adding some friendship! The cheery 41119 Cupcake Café set takes up residence right below Tony Stark’s apartment, and now fighting over the last blueberry muffin is the only acceptable reason to start a war.
LEGO’s new BrickHeadz may the latest fad, but French builder Jimmy Fortel is showing us they don’t have the market cornered for adorable superhero characters made of bricks. The Chibz characters, designed by Jimmy, are a bit larger than BrickHeadz and can incorporate great brick-built expressions into the faces as well as more detail on the bodies. Jimmy’s started off with 3 each from Marvel and DC, and has more planned.
