Category Archives: News

Stay current on the latest news and information about LEGO, from sales & deals to new set announcements. We also cover LEGO events and conventions all over the world.

4184 Black Pearl out + free shipping from LEGO extended [News]

A bit belated news for some, I realize — I’ve been sick — but 4184 Black Pearl is out now from multiple sources (text link goes to LEGO Shop; image link below goes to Amazon).

The highlight in this set for me is definitely the minifigs, with Davy Jones and the shark-headed Maccus. It goes for $100 (less at some big box stores at the moment) and includes 804 pieces.

Free shipping has been extended again from the LEGO Shop, with double VIP points through the end of October.

Finally, every purchase over $99 includes the first of a two-part Christmas vignette for free:

Here’s the second part, due out in November:

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Creations for Charity store now open!

The Creations for Charity store is now open where you can buy a custom Lego creation to fund the donation of Lego sets to Toys for Tots during the holidays. There are an unprecedented 35 MOCs to kick off this year’s store opening, and just about all are one-of-a-kind works sold on a first come, first serve basis.

More MOCs will be added to the store as new donations come in, and you can donate a Lego creation by November 15. I recommend checking the Creations for Charity website for updates on the fundraising progress and previews of new MOCs for sale, and above all, I hope you’ll take part in this year’s effort to brighten the holidays of many children.

Series 6 & 7 Collectible Minifigs revealed [News]

Nannan just posted about the 6860 Batcave and other 2012 sets, but I think this deserves its own post: We now have our first decent/official photos of the upcoming Collectible Minifigures Series 7.

Here’s what I’m seeing, with names I make up as I go along:

Internet Geek
Bride
Daredevil
Operatic Viking Lady
Tarzan & Cheetah
Easter Bunny
Swimmer
Tennis Player
Riot Grrrl
Aztec Warrior
Bagpiper
Future Cop 3000
Flower Child
Necromancer
Little Red Riding Hood
Poseidon/Neptune

Quite a diverse bunch!

EDIT: Not sure how we missed these, but here’s Series 6 (via Toys N Bricks):

High-res image of 6860 The Batcave and more 2012 sets

The official high-res image of 6860 The Batcave has been released. There are also additional pictures of 2012 sets from Star Wars, Cars, Spongebob, and Series 7 Minifigs posted on FBTB’s Flickr photostream.

LEGO Technic 8110 Mercedes-Benz Unimog U 400 [News]

The VW Camper Van isn’t the only German vehicle released in LEGO form this year. Long-time readers of the blog will recall that I’m obsessed with the Mercedes Unimog, and I’ve featured several — starting with Adam Grabowski’s Unimog back in 2006. Adam now works for LEGO as a designer. I don’t think Adam works on Technic sets, but it’s nice to see an official LEGO version of this awesome vehicle.

It’s been out for a few months, but I suspect it might be news for a couple of you out there. TechnicBricks has the full review.

Great Western Lego Show 2011 – guest report by JasBrick

A certain LEGO convention here in Seattle wasn’t the only major event happening this past weekend. To share what was going on in England, we’re pleased to bring you this guest report by JasBrick.

Whilst pictures from Brickcon this weekend tantalised those of us that could not get there (I almost fell off my chair when I saw the Tower of Orthanc by OneLug) I am pleased to say that my own weekend was filled with a Lego event closer to home… Steam: The Great Western Lego Show.

Since 2002 the annual Great Western Lego Show has been held in Swindon UK and this year was another amazing event that proved that this is the biggest Lego event in the UK calendar. The event is organised by Martin Long and a team of dedicated volunteers from the Brickish Association and is set in the impressive surroundings of the Steam Museum that is dedicated to the history of the British Railways (which means a serious number of Lego train MOC).

Steam consists of two public exhibition days and some fantastic opportunities for AFOLs to socialise (some people are still hungover ;-)). One thing that really stood out for me this year was the fact that the Lego company really made an extra effort to support this event with the presence of two designers (Jamie Berard and Morten Graff-Wang) over the whole weekend and the simultaneous unveiling of the new Castle Joust set in conjunction with Brickcon.

In addition to a huge number of pretty amazing standalone MOCs like Eyrie Town by Rod Gilles (2 much caffeine, an online friend that I had the pleasure of meeting for the first time at this event).

What makes Steam really special is the number and scale of collaborative displays at the event. One of my favourites was The World of Harry Potter that included a series of amazing scenes from the films recreated in Lego. Here is one picture of the Great Hall from Hogwarts by Thorskegga:

And the defence against the dark arts classroom by Andrew Danieli:

One event that dominated the early part of 2011 was the Royal Wedding in April and Warren Elsmore and a team of helpers have created one of the biggest builds I have ever seen with a very accurate recreation of Westminster Abbey… just look at the size of that monster:

For those more interested in Sci-Fi there was plenty on display such as the amazing layout by the Peter Reid (legoloverman, who also impressed me with a few wonderfully detailed custom minifigs that he had created before finally seeing the light and putting such heinous behaviour behind him) and Tim Goddard (RogueBantha):

Humour and amazing building combined in The Seige of Haradford Castle where James Pegrum (peggyjdb) was ably assisted by Barney Main (slyowl) in a rather vicious battle fought between the fleshie and yellow armies over the battlements of a truly impressive castle built by James. The battle progressed throughout the weekend culminating with a win for James after sneakily taking advantage of the fact that Barney had to leave early.

The above are just a few of the highlights of this tremendous weekend and please check out the Gimme Lego blog by Dr. Dave Watford for more insight into the event and the following galleries to see what amazed the over 7,000 visitors to this year’s display.

Looking forward to next year already!

Jas

BrickCon 2011: A word from the Prize Goddess

Aaah, BrickCon. That magical time each fall when hundreds of LEGO fans descend upon the Exhibition Center in Seattle for a relaxing weekend of fun, friendship, and sleep.

Wait. I’m kidding. Sleep never enters the equation.

BrickCon has morphed quite a bit for me from my first event to now. I began attending BrickCon in 2005 (it was NorthWest BrickCon at that point). The ENTIRE event fit into the Rainier Room, which now is just the general assembly room. This year marked my seventh BrickCon and ninth overall event.

Time flies when you’re having fun, right?

What’s also changed quite a bit for me is how I experience BrickCon. In the beginning, I was simply an attendee. I registered, I went, I showed off my MOCs, and I went on my merry way. I’d help out coordinating the Castle display when I could. But in 2009, that changed. At one of the SEALUG meetings, it was mentioned that they needed someone to coordinate prizes. “I can do that,” I thought. So I stepped up.

So there’s the story of how I became Prize Coordinator for BrickCon. I can blame (thank?) Sean Forbes for the “Prize Goddess” moniker, and that’s the one that stuck.

Determining which prize goes what, where, and to who is an entirely scientific process, but not really. It’s taking a look once again at what I have to work with and spreading it across the four major ceremonies that have door prizes (Opening, Keynote, Awards, Closing). Making sure those are dividing properly and separate from what goes to the public is important, too. Part of my job ensures that any incoming prizes are dividing amongst the various pools, too, so that one event isn’t too overloaded. I try and keep Closing as short as possible, too, since by that time people typically are packing to head home.

This year we added a sort of “Santa Claus” prize pool for public and private hours. During the public hours, volunteers would wander around the crowds and hand small sets (provided by the con) and kid’s t-shirts (provided by the LEGO Store in Bellevue) to the kids. Watching their faces was amazing; the look of disbelief was typically first, followed by the giant smile. There was some suspicion that the gifts were completely free, but it was pretty easy to work around. Anyone who passed out those prizes had the same smile.

It’s incredibly busy working with the prizes. In terms of BrickCon, if it didn’t involve prizes, I typically had no information or clue about it. My focus was prizes; I needed to be available to receive incoming donations and prep for the next assembly. I had enough time in between assemblies to enjoy spending time with my friends and enjoying BrickCon for what it is.

Thanks to Joe Meno, Andrew Becraft, and Bill Ward for their photos!

Wrap up: Castle at BrickCon 2011

I have to say that Castle totally rocked this year. This was my sixth year being involved in the Castle section at the Con and I think this was the best so far. Everyone involved really stepped it up this year and they all deserve a round of applause.

The quantity of creations was overwhelming and we had to beg, borrow and steal more area (Many thanks to Steve Walker and Wayne Hussey for making that process virtually painless and to Scott Fowler for graciously giving up part of the neighboring Pirate tables). But quantity doesn’t really say much about a section. It was the quality of the creations that really blew me away. I knew that the builders who were coming had skills but they all out did themselves.

Our collaborative layout was packed with so many builds, flowing from one to another, that it was difficult to see everything and the section of stand-alone models was outstanding.

We had three categories for which builders could win a trophy and a LEGO set. The voters were very hard pressed to make their selections, but they finally did and the winning models and builders were:

Best Overall Castle Creation:
Hogwart’s Castle by Alice Finch
Photo of Hogwart’s by Bill Ward

Best Community Contribution:
Al Wahat by Sebastiaan Arts

Best Fly-in Dragon:
Whiskers by Myself

Hearty thanks also need to go out to the following people and companies: To Will of Brickarms for the awesome contributor packs and prototype weapons that he made especially for us, to Ryan of BrickWarriors for the sweet fig packs he donated and to Learning Loft Toys for the Lego set prizes they donated to our winners.

We all had a great time and plan to make next year even bigger and better. So if you want to ‘Go Medieval’ at BrickCon next year, please join us! BrickCon!!!

Wrap Up: Numereji 2421 at BrickCon 2011

First of all, I’d like to thank everyone who contributed to the Numereji 2421 display at BrickCon in Seattle last weekend! Because of your skill and creativity people got a much clearer idea of our vision.

We plan on a Numereji 2422 collaborative display at BrickCon 2012 and look forward to the return of great creations, changes to reflect the passage of time, and phenomenal additions.

Congratulations to the winners in our four categories who were acclaimed by peer balloting!

Best Overall: The Ark by Drew Ellis (also Best Capital Ship for the entire Space display)
Best Building: Communication Station Iris by Alex Fojtik (counter-rotating arrays of awesome)
Best Terrain: Numereji Ranchero by Josh Wedin (and unofficial sillyness prize)
Best Vehicle: Scavenger by Shane Weckstrom (NPU purple basketball player pants)

Special thanks to Brandon Bannerman for his CSS Howland hull design and for working on the hulk up to the wire.

Justin Pyne also deserves a shout out for his very close second in the Terrain category and for embracing the challenge of a peaceful space town. Shows heart in a youngster.

I also enjoyed displaying my own Earthship House, and a barn built from a sections of Howland hull. More pics of that once I get a good light box set up and get rid of this stalker rain that followed me back to San Diego.

Steve Jobs (1955-2011)

A few hours ago, the world learned that it had lost one of its most brilliant stars. Apple co-founder and former CEO Steve Jobs died after a lengthy illness.

Nearly every post I’ve written on this blog, every line of code, and every photo I’ve taken has made its way through the MacBook sitting here on my lap. But more importantly, Jobs inspired a generation of creative professionals to do amazing things with their imaginations. And no matter what kind of computer or mobile device you’re reading this from, I know that’s something all of you out there can relate to.

New brick separator adds Technic axle pusher, tile-removing wedge

Paul Lee just got back from a trip to Billund, where he picked up a brick separator with some new features.

Paul says:

The brand new debricking tool. It’s smaller. Streamlined down to about the footprint of a 2 x 10 plate. There are many notable new features. There is a technic axle pusher for removing those stubbornly embedded axles. There are of course the standard top and bottom brick removing configurations. Also new is the pointed wedge at the back end of the lever, very useful for popping tiles and splitting plates that the other end can’t. It basically doubles as an ABS thumbnail. It’ll do whatever you would do with your thumbnail without ruining your manicure. Lastly, another nice added feature is the jumper plate offset in the underside, allowing the removal of jumper plates that the previous version of the tool could not handle.

LEGO in the White House

This is such a great photo. President Obama casually sits on a desk talking to three beaming winners from a science fair, each proudly holding their trophies built from LEGO.

Official caption: “President Barack Obama congratulates Google Science Fair winners, from left, Naomi Shah, Shree Bose, and Lauren Hodge in the Oval Office, Oct. 3, 2011.”

Thanks for the tip, Bruce!