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.

Clockwork dragonfly takes a rest

The placing of a LEGO model in a natural environment generally makes for poor photos which ruin the illusion of scale. However, this bejewelled clockwork dragonfly by Duncan Lindbo is the exception to the rule. The parts and colour choices here are perfect, creating a wonderful impression of functional mechanical elements and a smart clockpunk aesthetic. Displaying the dragonfly on a real lily-pad turns out to be a stroke of genius, highlighting the model’s non-biological nature, and perhaps prompting musings amongst more philosophical viewers on the contrast and blurred boundaries between artifice and life.

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There grows another rubber tree plant

Microscale LEGO building can be a real showcase for imaginative parts usage. The technique used for the trees and hedges in this delightful little park by Josephine Monterosso is fantastic: twisted rubber bands. This clever idea provides a genuine organic feel — something hard to achieve with bricks at this scale — and adds a level of detail which makes the scene look much bigger than it really is. Brilliant building.

LEGO Batman Movie 70913 Scarecrow Fearful Face-off [Review]

It’s been months since The LEGO Batman Movie hit screens to become one of the best pictures of the year. But the party isn’t over — five more LEGO sets are just out, bringing some of Batman’s most loveable enemies. The Brothers Brick has already covered the summer wave’s flagship, 70917 The Ultimate Batmobile, but the smaller boxes still hold some surprises. 70913 Scarecrow Fearful Face-off has 141 pieces, making it the third-smallest box among the LEGO Batman Movie sets, but its retail price of $14.99 makes it a perfect choice for Bat-fans looking to add to their collection.

It’s not the first time Batman has met Scarecrow in this line. In 70910 Scarecrow Special Delivery the villain tried to break into the Gotham energy plant disguised as a pizza delivery driver. This time the bad guy shows up piloting a helipcopter and bombarding the facility with fear gas bombs.

Click to read the rest of our review

Bright and cheery town square

Come and live in Haymarket — be part of a peaceful and serene community. Andrew Tate‘s chosen colors are the typical LEGO building hues yet the combinations he’s put together here are delightful. The overall feel and theme reminds me of the Bike Shop & Cafe Set (31026) but with an extended modular size. I’d happily wait in line to get one of these if it was ever to become a real set!

Faithful LEGO recreation of Kuala Lumpur’s Chinatown

Builder Vincent Kiew recreates a faithful representation of a row of shophouses in Petaling Street in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The little street has been the bustling heart of the city’s Chinatown since the late 19th century, and these buildings still stand today, preserved and maintained for future generations.

I’ve visited the street in real life myself, and it really is quite a sight to see. This LEGO scene is accurate right down to the little details, such as the open-top trucks and the store signage. Vincent has also built a version of the street depicting it in an earlier time, when mud and cobbles would have been home to horse-drawn carts.

TBB Weekly Brick Report: LEGO news roundup for June 11, 2017 [News]

In addition to the best LEGO models created by builders all over the world, The Brothers Brick also brings you the best of LEGO news and reviews. This is our weekly Brick Report for the second week of June 2017.

TBB NEWS & REVIEWS: TBB reports from LEGO headquarters in Billund, Denmark, and we get to escape the rathtars ourselves. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

Interview with LEGO Star Wars designers — We sat down with the LEGO Star Wars Design Director as well as the Graphic Designer to pick their brains about how your favorite sets go from concept to finished product.
Three huge LEGO dinosaurs move into LEGO House — TBB reports live from the nearly-completed LEGO House that three massive dinosaurs now calls home. One each of DUPLO, TECHNIC and a SYSTEM, each dinosaur is three meters tall!
Advance look inside LEGO House reveals dinosaurs and mountains — TBB got a behind-the-scenes peek at some of the impressive models, displays, and creative experiences in the LEGO House in Billund, opening September 28th
Review of LEGO Star Wars 75180 Rathtar Escape — With this playset, you get raging rathtars, new Star Wars minifigs (Kinjiklub and Guavian death gangs!) and the classic aging pair of Han Solo and Chewbacca.
Review of LEGO City Jungle 60161 Jungle Exploration Site — We dive into this huge set to check out all the new elements from the Jungle theme, like the jaguar, spider, and kayak, plus eight awesome minifigures.
The Brothers Brick 2017 Readers’ Survey — Speaking of Han Solo, this is your last week to win 75105 Millennium Falcon by filling out our TBB Readers’ Survey. We want to hear what you think about what we do.

OTHER LEGO NEWS: This week had a few other interesting LEGO-related news articles, so here are the best of the rest.

Adam Savage and Tested Crew Build the Epic LEGO Saturn V Rocket, Nerdist — Do you even knoll!? The Tested crew tackle another hard-to-find LEGO set and discover the true pleasures of advanced SNOT techniques.
Meet a giant Wonder Woman and her DC pals, made of LEGO, CNET — The Art of the Brick: DC Superheroes jumps across the pond from London to Washington D.C. to save the day! Nathan Sawaya used more than two million bricks to bring these classic comics to life.
Biggest mosaic made of LEGO bricks in Malaysia unveiled, The Sun Daily — This eight meter by 3 meter mosaic made of 87,000 bricks in Malaysia kicks off its “Let’s Go Raya” celebration. A fan-built Kampung House Diorama is also on display.

We don’t need a bigger boat

Although a bigger boat is sometimes a necessity, shrinking your favourite LEGO ships into more manageable proportions can be useful. Brick LeKao might have run out of display space, or perhaps he’s just a fan of more petite sets judging by his collection of cute Pirates of the Caribbean microscale ships. Silent Mary, the Black Pearl, and Queen Ann’s Revenge are all built in microscale, but despite their small size, they are completely recognisable as the famous vessels.

Click to see more adorably miniaturized pirate ships

It takes a cop from the future to fight a game from the past

In my opinion, the best movie from the 80’s has to be Kung Fury. Which is funny considering it’s actually a crowdfunded Swedish short made in 2015. This completely over-the-top parody pays homage to martial arts and cop action movies of the era. It features a murderous arcade machine, dinosaur-riding barbarian women, an army of incompetent Nazis, and even a cameo by David Hasselhoff. Watch it today! I loved it so much I even recreated a scene from the movie in LEGO…

Click here to go behind the scenes of this time hacking build

The dinosaurs will rule the earth again

Thin, mechanical-looking elements highlighted by translucent orange come together in a fantastically frightening mecha Dilophosaurus built by ckb ckd. The facial features of the mecha dinosaur make especially great use of parts, including Space Batman wings and various minifigure weapons.

Gangsters beware, the cops are coming

When LEGO gangsters cause mayhem in your town, you need to call in Dario Minisini‘s police flying squad in their vintage car! The shaping on this model is great — I particularly like the curve at the base of the rear bodywork — and the use of skis as front mudguards is inspired. I can almost hear the throaty old-school klaxon’s wail as this beauty skids around the corners of Old Chicago.

This vehicle wouldn’t look out of place in the vintage street scene Dario put together last year…

Sultans of sneak

In the depths of the Medina, behind the bazaar, the Sultan sneaks incognito through the arcade. Andrew JN evokes the architecture of the Middle East, and creates a nice sense of mystery and intrigue, in a LEGO diorama with a tiny 8×8 footprint. I love the restrained use of colour and the clean building style on display here. The use of turntable bases around the bottom is particularly effective, the layered archways are excellent, and the mosaic floor inside the arcade is nice touch.

LEGO church worthy of your worship

It’s a long-standing policy that LEGO will not develop any models containing religious elements. I’ve always thought that’s a shame for the Castle theme in particular, where churches and cathedrals would have been some of the most important buildings. Thankfully LEGO fans have stepped in to fill the void, and this hilltop church by Simon NH is a great example.

The landscaping is done well, with a nice mix of earthy colours, a few trees, and a couple of gravestones to break things up. But the main attraction is clearly the church itself. It’s well-shaped, with diverse colours that still hang together as a cohesive whole, and the roof and steeple are excellent. The steeple also has some nice parts usage going on — don’t miss the boat hulls creating arched windows, and the lovely little cross on top.