Tag Archives: Castle

Dragons! Knights in shining armor! Trebuchets & ballistas! From enormous LEGO castles buttoned up for battle to peaceful village market scenes, we’ve got your LEGO Castle needs covered right here.

A fortified village with a seaside view

I imagine being a fisherman in the middle ages was a modest but good life–if you count out living out in the open, ready to be raided. Jako of Nerogue solves this problem for his fishermen with the fortifications around the village he built. This facilitates both a picturesque and also practical feeling about this whole diorama.

I love how the diorama really makes sense. The village is confined by the wooden walls, and nothing is left outside… Or maybe it was just all pillaged. Sadly there are not many pictures showing the fortification’s interior, but the outside is impressive enough on its own. The mixing of dark tan with exotic greens is very realistic and pleasant to look at, and the grass also hides some cleverly used clip pieces to simulate taller blades of grass. The whole diorama is brought together with a few splashes of brighter colours, like the regular green bushes and a bit of water in the back.

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Beorn’s beautiful building built by bricks

A few years have passed from The Lord of the Rings and Hobbit hysteria that included an official LEGO theme, but many builders still find inspiration in Tolkien’s fantasy universe. Roanoke Handybuck is one of these builders and his latest creation is Beorn’s house. We can see the party of dwarves accompanied by the Grey Wizard and Bilbo Baggins meeting the master of the house.

The builder uses colours and their combinations to great advantage, especially mixing the dark tan and olive green, which seem to naturally fit together. Do not limit your attention only to the beautifully flowing roof, because the stonework of the house’s walls is quite impressive too, as is a plethora of details spread around the diorama.

The right place to practice your mystical arts

Enchantments, potions and magic! What else would one need? César Soares sure knows what is important in life – who cares about all that pointless real stuff, right? Joking aside, this is a pretty impressive creation. The builder says he has wanted to build in this scale for quite some time, and I can totally agree. Minifig utensils and the thicknesses of some bricks are often out of proportion with the minifigs they are made for, and that often looks very cartoony. This is not a bad thing on its own, but some times, it is nice to see more realistic Miniland scale creations like this one.

I have said that this creation is impressive, and just being built in Miniland scale is obviously not enough to achieve that. The scene is filled with unique part usage, most notably cloth pieces. Just look at the broom and the unrolled scroll! And still there is more to see, like legs of the chair and table that are tilted off right angles, clever use of the log minifig costume under the table on the right and the wall texture, which uses a technique most often seen as floor, due to how unstable it would be when set upright. I wonder what kind of magic César used to keep it in place!

“Storm, earth and fire, heed my call!”

Orcs can be beautiful, as Dr. Zarkow demonstrates in his Warcraft-inspired Orc Burrow. Everything here, from landscaping details to the building itself is well-executed. The use of cheese slopes to create the impression of rough stonework on the hut is particularly brilliant. If you’d like to see how he achieved this technique, he has been kind enough to share a photograph of how it was done. There are also some really playful details, including the pig hitched to a cart filled with wheat. Seeing that made me squeal with excitement!

Distinctive fortress rises from the rocks

We’ve seen our fair share of massive LEGO castles. The effort put into these creations is always impressive, but here’s one whose styling makes it stand out from the rest. Amenk Sachio has created a beautifully distinctive fortress whose appeal goes way beyond simply being big. Soaring towers, buttresses and bridges, balconies and balustrades — this stunning castle has it all. The surrounding landscaping is suitably epic, with the odd burst of plant life and tumbling waterfalls to break up the rockwork. Things might have benefitted from a bit of action, but even without any minifigures to bring the scene to life, this is an amazing LEGO creation.

This close-up view of the main door gives a nice look at the level of intricate detailing which has gone into the model despite its massive scale. I love the sand green steps, and the unusual crest above the entranceway. The use of numerous pearl gold pieces as highlights is just the most noticeable element in those wonderful walls. Don’t miss the clever use of arches and angled bricks amidst all that grey, creating a rich depth of texture despite the limited colour palette…

I’ll take what’s behind door number two please

Doors are always full of unknowns, and far too often it’s a gateway into another world. Every door that you open up for the first time is a surprise, a world that you’ve never seen before. Everywhere you go, doors are meant to be opened, with the exception of this one — it’s meant to stay closed for a very good reason. While what’s behind this door by why.not? is curious enough to tease our imaginations, I’m actually more intrigued by the mysterious technique used to create the door arch at the top. It’s a puzzle worth solving more than what’s behind the door.

Centaur Knight Mech takes it to the Nexo level

It looks like when LEGO 7 finds inspiration and the right LEGO bricks, nothing can stop him from delivering awesome creations one after another. A stunning Nexo King is now accompanied by a gorgeous Centaur Knight Mech. This hero consists of a crazy variety of pieces — slopes, modified plates and bricks, tiles of many shapes and types — which both make its body and legs very flexible and awash with tiniest details. Of course, proper lighting of the model during the photo shoot makes the transparent orange pieces glow as if they are full of nexo energy, and this is simply awesome.

Hobbiton is more than just Bag End!

The excellent photography and advanced building techniques may be what drew my attention to this creation by Patrick B., but they are not the most interesting part to me. What is so unique about this creation is the accompanying description, crediting a handful of builders who inspired Patrick’s Sandyman’s Mill, either by building their own versions prior or as Patrick’s sources for some techniques used. It is normal for builders to both reuse previously discovered techniques and credit their sources, but I rarely see it like this particular example. It almost reads like a scientific publication!

Click to see and read more about the build!

Incredible sprawling Victorian-age LEGO city has a railroad, a church, docks, factories and more

Built by the members of SwissLUG as a collaborative build, this amazing Victorian-age city has details everywhere you look. Unlike many LEGO cities, the properly scaled tall ship at the docks doesn’t dwarf the rest of the layout, fitting right in while also serving as a beautiful anchor in the center of the scene.

Click to see more pictures of this amazing LEGO port

The scroll containing the secrets of dragon taming

It takes a lot these days to impress with a LEGO castle creation, and while an interesting roof technique and deceptively simple rockwork can help, this floating island scene by ArzLan shows creativity a level higher. The build doesn’t just feature new ways to build something seen before, but adds another dimension with an open scroll from which the island emerges.

It is not a coincidence that I mentioned the roof technique and the rocks as examples of attractive traits of a build, because those are two of the highlights in this particular example. The dragon is important too – it is very well built and adds a lot of life to the scene. The scroll is great as well, and it should not be taken only as a unique subject, but also as a well-built scroll in its own right.

The hottest and coolest guard post

What better place to stand guard during the winter than by a hot spring? The scenery in this diorama by Jaap Bijl truly is something to look at — in fact, perhaps it’s “scenery” that the dwarves are protecting!

The builder has used his signature sagging roof style lined with a bit of snow, along with some nice wood construction on the building. While the building uses some new ideas, the star of the show is the hot spring. It uses window pane pieces as the water to make the surface extremely smooth, giving it a great reflection and allowing the deep colours underneath to be seen. These colours continue outwards on the shore in a gentle gradient to the sulfuric yellow that ends under the snow.

Open the book and let your legend unfold

It says in this unique creation that every legend has a beginning, and I believe this is indeed the beginning of Malin Kylinger‘s legend. As a newcomer to the online LEGO fan community, her photostream on Flickr is hardly half a year old. Malin’s photostream has already accumulated a few, very cute builds, but this vibrant fantasy scene is a level higher than the rest.

Obviously what makes this build unique is the ornate open book with the words “Every legend has a beginning”, but the build is much more than that. The landscape seems to be spilling into the book, while a sea serpent emerges out of the latter with a very dynamic water splashing effect. The serpent is quite good too, most notably the shaping around its eye. I can not wait to see this legend continue… Both the Legend of Anendra and of Malin.