The whimsical R 194 is back with a LEGO build titled “DDD (DODO Delivery)” that belongs in the world of Mary Poppins. From the brown hat to the multicolored socks to the blue and white umbrella, this dodo clearly has style. There are a lot of fun details to enjoy, like the glasses perched on the dodo’s beak and red messenger back hung around its beck.
This shot focuses more on the individual items, including a small suitcase and wagon filled with even more tidbits.
Say that ten times fast! I’m just keeping you on your toes, like these busy little creatures. If you’ve ever worked on a farm or ranch, you know the job can be hard work. Barn swallows, named such because they often nest in barns, are no slouches! These beautiful birds, recreated here in LEGO by Bricolé, spend countless hours building their mud nests and raising up to 10 babies (in two clutches) a year! They’re always in a hurry and even eat while on the go! They earn their spot in the barn by scooping up tons of pesky flying insects.
As wonderful of a color it is (and as great as it looks here), LEGO “earth blue” or “dark blue” doesn’t quite do the bird justice. In real life it’s pretty stunning. That said, I love the movement in this build – especially the windswept vibe of the “grass” as the wings swoosh past. The katanas for the swallowtail are also a nice touch.
While you’re here, don’t miss out on all the other incredible animal builds we’ve featured!
Thank you for joining us again for another edition of The Brothers Brick’s nature documentary series, Planet Brick. Today we’ve spotted Joss Woodyard’s well-camouflaged Nettledrake. Made up of many LEGO pieces you’d traditionally think to use for plant life, this magnificent beast is naturally hidden. If you happen to come across one in the wild yourself, it’s best to observe from a distance and see it spread its wings and take flight. Don’t be drawn in by its pretty pink spots or tail. If you get too close, you might get stung by the vicious beast’s teeth or talons. Thanks for stopping by and discovering another beautiful creature inhabiting Planet Brick.
Of course the bird is the word, but the bird is also the nerd as evidenced by wise old owls and the fact that little birds have a tendency to provide information to people. The cerebral nature of the species is also captured in Isaac Snyder’s brick-built avian critters sporting some stylish specs.
The pair of fowls here appear to be around the size of an average brickheadz model and they are crafted out of bricks and tiling as well as slopes which allow for curvy avian features. Both builds utilize two 1×1 cheese slopes to fashion beaks and 1×2 plates to minimally render their feet. The penguin and the owl also feature the squinting eye 1×1 round tiles, but each bird has their own distinctive eyewear – the penguin with its round frame and the owl with a square one. While simple and compact, these builds are still certainly a hoot!
We all know you can build things out of LEGO, but “building something that you build something out of, out of LEGO” is a sentence that I don’t get to write all that often. Brickleas gave me the chance with this fun diorama of in-progress model building. It makes use of the clip-flag seed part from Iron Forge a whopping 30 times, and finding them all is a fun exercise. My favorites are the bird’s beak, the dab of paint, and the blade in the well-built craft knife. The rest of the scene has some great details, too. I’m fond of the interesting texture in the hobby mat from the dark green tiles. And the branch the bird is perched on makes use of the minifigure tree disguise. It might be obvious in retrospect, but it feels clever to me.
This year’s Iron Forge has gifted us with a ton of interesting builds, as our archives show. Go take a look!
From the Andean condor to the black-necked swan, Luis Peña García has shared his appreciation of South American birds and wildlife by recreating them in LEGO. This time, Luis builds the Cahuil gull, also known as the brown-hooded gull. The red minifig flippers make excellent webbed feet for navigating the marshes and freshwater lakes. The 1×1 printed round eye tile is the perfect representation of the Cahuil gull’s white feathers around its eye. Simplistic and full of great part usages, this lil’ guy is the perfect desk buddy or shelf display.
Gather up your parts and begin building! Click here to for the instructions on how to make your own Cahuil Gull
Life size (or near life size) birds have long been a popular subject matter for LEGO creations. While many previous birds have featured some pretty cool parts usage, KitKat1414 uses a pretty innovative technique for this Robin’s face. It’s just one piece, but a red minifigure torso managed to accomplish so many different things.
The first thing that jumps out at you is the arm holes as eyes. The size is just perfect. Second, you’ll see the neck as the bird’s beak. Sure it’s round where a real beak should be conical, but it very clearly represents and communicates that piece of the bird’s anatomy. Finally, the not to be overlooked, subtle design feature the torso lends to this bird is the angle it gives the face. I can’t think of any other single LEGO piece, or even pair of pieces that could accomplish as much as this one, incredibly common, often overlooked element does.
Ordinarily at The Brothers Brick, we writers try not to re-use the title a builder gives to a build as the title for our article; however, sometimes it is just too perfect, and I cannot resist. Now, in this case, it is also true that I wrote the title for the build, since I built it. And when the centerpiece of the build is armless LEGO minifigure torsos, it is in fact true that three minifigures gave both their left and right arms for these houses. The build might be simple, with an uncomplicated fence and vegetation, but combined together it looks pleasant, a delightful little home for birds. And those books do an excellent job keeping out the rain.
I built this for the Iron Forge building competition, where anyone can compete to get a shot at dethroning one of the reigning Iron Builders. There’s still time to get some entries in if you fancy wearing an iron crown yourself!
Any regular reader of the Brothers Brick knows, LEGO fans can do some pretty amazing things with the wide variety of different LEGO pieces out there. Those endless possibilities include limiting yourself to a smaller palette of parts and colours, like Milan Sekiz has done with his series of Stick Statue creations.
Keep reading to see the rest of these simple yet expressive models
It takes a talented builder to take a very specialized LEGO part, like a train switch, and turn it into something totally different. Of course, we all know Jonas Kramm is a talented builder, so it should come as no surprise that he managed to make a train switch into a painting of a peacock. It is unquestionably the best peacock head I have ever seen done in LEGO form, and perhaps the best bird head, too. The bumps on the switch make perfect nostrils, and it also works well as the eyes on the tail. But Jonas did not stop there: he also used the part for the lantern flame, and the drawer pulls. Not to mention the Jurassic World gyrosphere for the lantern glass and the green snake for paint. It’s a great composition of a great composition, for sure!
Like Jonas’ builds? Then check out some more. And don’t miss the Iron Builder action, where the train switch is the seed part.
You don’t have to be a birdwatcher to appreciate this collection of South American birds by Luis Peña. Each South American bird is built from between 35-55 LEGO pieces and would look great on your display shelf, desk, or bookshelf.
First is the Black-necked swan, which swims on a small stand of water.
Birds are an enigma, and this LEGO one by DOGOD Brick Design is no exception. Well, okay, we do know it’s a Taiwan blue magpie, the so-called “long tailed mountain lady.” And we can see that there’s some really nice naturalistic shaping happening. A combination of ball joints, hinges, and curved slopes allow for the wings to curve gracefully around the body. And the yellow 1×1 round plates make for a suitably mysterious (or just bird-brained) expression.
But beyond that? Total mystery.
If you want to try and figure out more about our brick-built avian friends, then you could always dig deeper into our archive of LEGO birds. Who knows what you might discover?