Category Archives: LEGO

You’d probably expect a lot of the posts on a LEGO website like The Brothers Brick to be about LEGO, and you’d be right. If you’re browsing this page, you might want to consider narrowing what you’re looking for by checking out categories like “Space” and “Castle.” We’re sure there’s something here that’ll fascinate and amaze you.

The procession: an elegant church edifice

We recently featured a wonderful mosque from brickbink, and now he has come up with an amazing church! Although the diorama only presents the façade of the structure, it is so full of simple details that you don’t even notice the overall smaller footprint. The grand clock, stained glass, worn-out stucco, and pilasters all add up to an impressive build. The roof work, stairs, and floor tiles are simple yet effective additions to the scene and the result is made very charming with carefully selected minifigures.

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For bricks, they flew pretty good

Take a look into the brick-built airplane cockpit built by kosbrick. With carefully selected printed LEGO elements and clever use of minifigure paint rollers as the throttle and steering wheels, the scene looks authentic and ready for takeoff.

Reminder: Win the new LEGO Batcave from TBB in March [News]

In case you’ve been living in a cave, here’s a reminder that The Brothers Brick is giving away the new 76052 LEGO Batman Classic TV Series Batcave. If you haven’t entered yet, you still have another week to enter. We’ll be picking and contacting the winner at the beginning of April.

And yes, we’ll ship it anywhere in the world that we’re allowed to ship things (our apologies to astronauts on the International Space Station and the citizenry of North Korea). Be sure to follow us on Facebook and other social media for future giveaways like this.

This month’s contest prize kindly provided by LEGO.

There’s no arch in architecture

Air, light, work, sports, hygiene, comfort and efficiency: these are the guidelines that governed the design of Villa Cavrois. This massive home in France was built by Robert Mallet-Stevens between 1929 and 1932, and is considered part of the International Style of architecture. The mansion has a storied past: it was occupied by the German Army during World War II, and most of the custom-built furniture was sold off in the 1980s. But now it’s a historical monument, open to the public for viewing. If you can’t make it all the way to northern France, at least you can ogle this model from Swedish builder o0ger, whose rendition is reminiscent of the LEGO Architecture theme.

This is Hallowe….wait, Easter

As a fan of horror movies, I know that a good monster has to have character. It’s why even if they’re scary, you can’t look away. The Harvestman, by the always intriguing Djordje, has character in spades.

The shapes of this LEGO creation are amazing and a great use of the new pieces released with the new buildable Star Wars figures, but the biggest draw here is the face — the shape, the fact that it only has one creepy yellow eye with just 3 fangs. It looks like it belongs in a Tim Burton stop motion film, and it was built with LEGO. In fact, I would love to see a stop motion horror film starring Djordje’s builds.

Issue 18 of Blocks Magazine now available [News]

Issue 18 of Blocks Magazine hits shelves in the UK today. This month, the publication celebrates all things Batman v Superman with an exclusive series of builds, reviews of new sets and the low-down on how to create the perfect Dark Knight Tumbler. Plus an exclusive interview with LEGO artist Nathan Sawaya on his new DC Comics exhibition.

Also in this issue, MOD Squad member Daniel Konstanski shows how to improve your Carbon Freezing Chamber, there are reviews of the new TT Games offering and the latest Frozen sets, and a behind-the-scenes look at David Pickard’s Blacktron project. Get it today!

First look at The LEGO Batman Movie, including teaser trailer [News]

Following on from the global success of The LEGO Movie back in 2014, a spin-off movie starring the supremely popular LEGO Batman character is due for release on Februrary 10th, 2017. The LEGO Batman Movie stars Batman, once more voiced by Will Arnett. Warner Bros have released a few stills from the movie to give us a sneak peak.

[Update] Hot on the heels of the film stills being released, Warner Brothers has released the full teaser trailer.

Click to see more stills from the movie

Who says you can’t teach an old build new tricks

Notice anything familiar about Simon Schweyer‘s most recent build? You should because this lush landscape was featured on our blog last month. At that time, however, this two-toned rocky shoreline was home to a thriving Greek Polis. Simon ingeniously (and quite literally) razed his Greek city to the ground and started building anew on the existing bedrock. His resulting medieval scene is so different from the original build that I didn’t recognized the recycled landscape at first. Both builds are jaw dropping, but I prefer the Red Shield Inn. Simon truly hit his stride the second time around.

Apparently, experienced builders are known to repurpose parts of their builds from time to time. And why not? Recycling saves time and tests the limits of your creativity. It forces you to step back and really think about your build. Then transform it into something completely different. I’ve never recycled a build of my own, but I’m eager to give it a try now that I’ve seen Simon’s success with the technique. One note of caution for those of you who also plan to give this a try: Be cautious when repurposing an old build into an entry for a contest. Many LEGO competitions have rules specifically prohibiting this kind of thing. Be sure to check first.

I’m curious to know what other transformation have taken place. Have you repurposed part of a build before? And if so, were you able to recycle anything other than the landscape?

Do you need worms?

Whenever I want to see a LEGO creation about sailing, I take a look at Arjan Oude Kotte’s photostream. Once again he has not failed me with his latest addition to his portfolio, a charming bait shop. The asymmetric structure of the shack is full of amazing details and greebles. A perfect number of items and minifigures are scattered around making it a very lively scene!

The scenery is very warm thanks to the choice of colors both for the model and the background. It makes me want to take a stroll on the pier and spend a couple of hours listening to the sound of waves and watching people go by. Unfortunately, I live in a landlocked city and all I can do for now is to take a look at his Flickr album.

LEGO Vegeta; all the snark and aggression, but with more plastic

With fellow animated show Adventure Time becoming a retail set soon, it seems a shame that the famous Dragon Ball series will probably never see an official set (perhaps thanks to a few scenes involving a blue-haired character and her underwear).

Regardless, the beauty of being a LEGO fan is being able to make what the company won’t, and today Logey Bear did that with the Saiyan prince Vegeta.

While this is a remix of the builder’s previous model, the addition of the warm gold armour pieces to make up the well-known Saiyan armour, as well as a brick-built head (distinct “M” pattern hairline included) and there’s no mistaking who this is.

You never know what’s in the cellar of an evil wizard

Strange technological contraptions? Weird magical equipment? Portals to another dimension? Dusty books of arcana? A cage full of—cough—volunteers? An evil wizard’s basement always holds a mystery—just pray you’re not one of them. I’m not sure precisely what’s going on in this scene by Pistash, but it’s certainly fascinating and maybe a little horrifying.

LEGO.com celebrates its 20th anniversary today [News]

LEGO joined the digital revolution on March 23, 1996 when its first iteration of LEGO.com went live. The original website was a spartan layout, since large images and fancy graphics were the bane of dial-up modems. We’ve seen a lot of changes in the intervening 20 years, including huge leaps in technology and the usefulness of LEGO.com, as well as major changes within the company itself. Just a few short years after 1996, LEGO would find itself on the brink of bankruptcy, but thanks to a shift in focus back to its roots, centered around solid building and strong themes, LEGO has rebounded to become the world’s largest toy company.

LEGO has put together a special site to celebrate its 20-year anniversary, which includes a simple game where correctly matching five 1996 versions of sets, minifigs, and animals with their 2016 counterparts nets you a download of a nostalgic 1996 LEGO wallpaper. There appear to be 10 wallpapers, one each from Freestyle, Train, Pirates, Technic, Castle, Aquazone, Town, Exploriens, Western and Time Cruisers, and you can play multiple times if you want the full set.