Tag Archives: Architecture

LEGO provides the perfect medium for recreating the buildings and landmarks of the world — LEGO has even released a line of official LEGO Architecture sets. Check out our coverage of the official sets, and don’t miss all the gorgeous architectural models created by LEGO fans from around the world.

New Century Corner

Finnish AFOL Eero Okkonen created the most amazing street corner ever and we all love modular buildings at The Brothers Brick, especially when they have a distinct taste in architecture! So a mix of art-nouveau buildings inspired by the dream-like city of Prague definetely catches our eyes. Luckily, Eero went to further lengths to name each of the five houses, wrote brief explanations on building techniques and also provided some photographs of inspiring places. Read them all on his personal blog.

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Nine projects qualify for the first 2016 LEGO Ideas review [News]

The official LEGO Ideas blog has just confirmed that nine LEGO Ideas projects have hit the 10,000 votes required to go on to the first review of 2016.

The nine projects include two Star Wars based ideas – a rolling BB-8 and the Jedi high council chamber. There are four minifigure scale buildings: an old fishing store, modular railway station, Jurassic Park visitor centre and a gingerbread house. The movie based project this time is Johnny Five, a model of the eponymous robot. Finally, in the science themed section we have a fossil museum display of dinosaur skeletons and a functional model of a particle accelerator.

Readers: Which projects have captured your attention, and which do you think will go on to pass the strict LEGO review criteria and become an actual LEGO set?

See a short description of each project by the creator after the jump

Polk Library of UW Oshkosh in LEGO microscale

Microscale master Paul Wellington recreated the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh’s campus library at the University’s request. Paul used approximately 4800 individual LEGO pieces to achieve a convincing scale replica of the building and surrounding greenery. Some of the excellent microscale techniques on display here include vertical tiles set into the base as columns, and the trees (a similar style to those seen in Rocco Buttliere’s Palace of Westminster).

See more of Paul’s microscale work on his Flickr page.

The height of good microscale

This lovely towerblock by delayice is a great piece of microscale building. The blue and grey color scheme creates a sense of modernity and style, and there’s good details in the lower lobby building at the tower’s base. Check out the offset “headlight brick” providing wall texture and window detailing — nice work.

A chinese street in Jakarta

We often see modular buildings with European architecture, but the world is a much bigger place and offers many other forms of beauty. Kosmas Santosa from Jakarta decided to take matters into his own hands and built three modular buildings with Indonesian/Chinese architecture. The diorama is comprised of a tea house, a pharmacy and a residential building which are all inspired by actual locations. Despite the fact that these inspiring buildings look ruined, Kosmas took a nostalgic step and reanimated the street as a lively place.

You can find more detailed pictures on Kosmas’s own website. He built this diorama as part of a Bhinneka LUG display and even made a few trucks and carts to live up the scene.

This LEGO gallery is a work of art

This fantastic minifig scale art gallery is a creation by Tyler Sky and his wife Frances. The gallery includes both LEGO depictions of actual works of art and some new creations by the builders themselves. Atop the largest floor, you can see a LEGO version of Four Boats Stranded and inside the large window the obvious red square is part of Composition II in Red, Blue and Yellow. The Orca on display in the foreground is definitely one of my favourite parts of this build.

The inside of Tyler’s art gallery is worth taking a virtual stroll through. See if you can spot the white croissants used as an internal architectural feature. Don’t miss the tribute to Bob Ross on the first floor balcony; he is standing painting happy little trees.

There goes the neighborhood

Have you ever seen abject poverty up close, where it lives? The brain almost doesn’t want to accept it: you literally cannot believe it. People can’t possibly live like this: but they do. And ironically, there is a kind of beauty there: colors that a designer would never choose, patterns that leave the eye wanting. The humanity of it cannot be contained. Shannon Sproule perfectly captures the heartbreaking chaos and vitality of economics gone horribly wrong in this wonderful vignette. And the presentation, spoofing the classist bias of the LEGO Architecture line, really hits home. Don’t expect to see this set in the next catalog.

Kid’s room lovingly recreated in LEGO

Kelvin Low takes a break from his usual fun mecha models to bring us a beautiful rendition of a kid’s playroom.

The recreation of the painted wall is obviously charming, but I love the sense of clutter and the feeling that this room is genuinely lived-in. Too often LEGO scenes like this can be a bit stark, lacking life, and looking like showhouse photos. This room feels “real” and I can just imagine kids having a great time playing in it.

Badshahi Mosque built with LEGO bricks

Recreating an actual building is often challenging with LEGO bricks and it becomes even harder when you need to build curved surfaces. It seems that John Snyder didn’t find the perfect solution to form the onion domes of Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, Pakistan. Nevertheless, he came up with an amazing oriental diorama! He has applied very subtle touches decorating the architectural piece and captured the overall appereance of the mosque very well. Careful tiling, delicate minarets and clear photography make the model appear less complicated than it really is. But it must have been a very hard build. Good job John!

Santa Maria del Fiore in microscale

Once, when I was in Italy, I had a chance to visit one of the cathedrals — and was rendered speechless. The massive scale and timeless beauty of these historic works of art is awesome. Each cathedral has its own history and architectural details, and the Santa Maria del Fiore (or Il Duomo, if you prefer) in Florence is a stunning example.

While the original took centuries to complete, Legorevival Lrevival‘s version is small, compact, and considerably easier to construct. He’s given this beautiful landmark the LEGO Architecture treatment, and it’s totally one I’d love to buy someday. It’s instantly recognizable.

Tiny brick-built brownstone neighborhood welcomes you home

Looking for a new place? Barton Thinks has the perfect neighborhood for you. These microscale brownstone homes are just adorable. The build is full of great detail, which can be tricky when you’re working in microscale. The easily recognizable brownstone architecture caught my eye, but check out that wonderful stoplight!

I love the roof and bay windows the building has, all packed into a small footprint. Each home sits on just 3 by 6 studs, making the whole module just 16 by 16 studs.

Giant 4 foot tall LEGO model of Nebraska state capitol

I’ve been watching John Tooker slowly construct his replica of the Nebraska state capitol for several years, and the final building is incredibly impressive. The real Nebraska capitol is the tallest of the United States’ 50 state capitol buildings, and John’s model beautifully captures the magnificent art-deco spire which towers over the surrounding plains. Take a look at the tiny people on the steps to get a sense of tower’s vast scale.