Tag Archives: Characters

We love builds with character! Creating characters from LEGO elements, whether traditional System bricks or using elements from Bionicle and Constraction themes, is an amazing way to showcase your building skills. Brining out emotion and personality in bricks is an art!

Don’t lose your head over this elegant mantis

The praying mantis female will sometimes consume the head of the male while mating. What’s this self-made widow’s secret? alex_mocs knows that there’s nothing more alluring than Bionicle and Constraction elements, seamlessly integrated into organic LEGO builds. This model of the
Viridis Mantidae is the pinnacle of elegance with a touch of menace. Like a master sculptor, alex manages to coax disparate LEGO elements together in ways that suggest that this was the role they were destined to play, from the green whip antennae to the Ninjago sail wings to the Bionicle chest.

alex_mocs is one of the organizers of the Bio-Cup. The first round, with the theme “Dreams,” closes on June 9th. If you’re interested in building MOCs that play with non-system elements like alex’s model here, it’s not too late to enter. Don’t worry – they won’t bite!

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Cello, is it me you’re looking for?

Yes, yes, I know this is probably a double bass rather than a cello. But I couldn’t come up with a bass-based pun for the title, so you’ll just have to bear with it. Besides, we should be focussing on this terrific LEGO musician as built by Mattia Carredu. The cello/double bass/contrabass/whatever it is is very well-sculpted – the wands for tuning pegs are a great touch. So, too, is its player, looking resplendent in blue. There are some great techniques at play here as well. Her dress includes an upturned cupcake tin, and the hat is a terrific arrangement of droid arms around a wheel. Individually, they’re great builds – but put together, they are the very picture of elegance!

Paranoid android disappears completely into exit music

AI “doomers” worry about the devastating impact artificial superintelligence could have on humanity, but what if the real doom is the crushing sadness felt by the machines? Builder Kat calls this LEGO creation the e-motion engine, and just going by those eyes (created from the negative space in a Bionicle Phantoka torso), this little guy could be the slightly more adjusted sibling of Marvin the Android. Kat draws on a wild mix of parts, from a Vidyo strap for the headphones to inverted tire knees to a stylish Scala jacket. Kat doesn’t post often, but each of her builds is a treat, especially her entries into the 2023 BioCup (like this incredible Cyberpunk scene). Which reminds me, the competition is returning soon!

I Didn’t Mean to Build a LEGO Camel (But I Did Anyway) [Guest Feature]

Today we’re excited to present a special feature from accomplished film editor and LEGO modeler Nick Lever. Nick was a finalist in season 4 of LEGO Masters Australia and has had his work displayed in LEGO House in Billund. In this guest post, Nick shares his experience working with LEGO’s Middle East division to celebrate Innovation and Creativity Day. Nick, the floor is yours!

Join Nick for a look into how his camel project with LEGO came together

Otaku icons Yotsuba and Danbo in LEGO&!

Outside of Otakudom, Yotsuba might not be as familiar as Calvin and Hobbes or Dennis the Menace, but this genki girl from the long-running manga offers a similar authentic and charming child’s view of the world. To celebrate a new volume, Ids de Jong builds Yotsuba in LEGO, along with her cardboard companion Danbo. Yotsuba is posed among sunflowers, a motif used on the book covers. Ids uses bright green bricks for the hair, a color that is quite scarce, and even pick-a-brick has limits of 10 for some parts, but the results are spot on.

Ids previously made a Hatsune Miku character that is equally kawaii.

Ekko from Arcane transformed into a LEGO legend

Mitch Phillips isn’t just a phenomenal LEGO character builder – he’s also a great teacher at how to break free from the LEGO grid and create impossible shapes full of personality. His latest creation is the hero Ekko from Arcane, the animated series based on League of Legends. The build started with Ekko’s face and iconic hourglass face paint (the hero’s powers involve time manipulation), and an afro made from twisted rubber bands.The mix of curves and angles is a perfect match for the animated series’s signature style.

Mitch breaks it all down in his video walkthrough, which is an essential watch if you’re curious about techniques that push LEGO elements to their limits. Not visible in the photograph is the most insane parts usage – the hoverboard’s rotor is made from a ring of Clone Trooper visors using a connection I’ve never seen before.

The name Ekko also suggests a mash-up of Eero Okkonen, another character builder whose creations some of Mitch’s design invokes. Coincidence…?

Take a trip through the LEGO looking glass for two very different spins on Alice

When LEGO introduced a new scale of buildable figures for characters like Wednesday Addams, the sets introduced interchangeable printed faces with big eyes. As builder lavishlump points out, these faces are quite similar to the ones used for the popular Japanese Nendororoid figures and work great for LEGO anime characters too. Lavishlump used the Glinda face for a model of Alice Margatroid, a magical puppeteer from a Japanese PC game.

LegoWyrm uses the same techniques for a very different video game Alice – the heroine of American McGee’s Alice. Wednesday’s goth expression is a perfect match for this dark spin on Wonderland.

Time will tell if LEGO continues to release buildable figures at this scale and expand the face options for anime fans, but for now it’s great to see a specialized part spur creativity in the community.

Maxx’s Moomin is here to melt your heart

The Moomins, created by Finnish/Swedish author Tove Jansson, are timeless characters long cherished in Scandinavia, Japan, and increasingly the world, thanks to new printings of the amazing storybooks and comics, merchandise, movies, and even a new video game. One medium that Moomin hasn’t conquered yet is LEGO, but Maxx Davidson corrects this oversight. Moomin, ever the awkward romantic, is a perfect subject for Maxx’s whimsical style of building. I would love to see Jansonn’s characters come to LEGO so that I can admire them as I drink from one of my many Moomin mugs. If the residents of Moominvalley continue to grow in recognition, maybe they’ll eventually make it through the Ideas or Icons lines. Until then, I’ll hold Maxx’s model in my heart.

LEGO Avacyn has flying, vigilance, and protection from brick separators

Back when I played Magic, the Gathering, I was more of a green or black player, but I lost more than a few games to angel-themed white decks with their ability to cancel incoming damage. For his latest character creation, Eero Okkonen translates Magic’s seraphic hero Avacyn from the plane of Innistrad into brick form, and the results are divine. The wings are substantial but somehow look light, balanced on the angel’s back. Avacyn’s bust is cleverly shaped from a pair of bigfig arms. The lance head with macaroni tubes is perfect. Showing that even a master is always learning, Eero shares that the angled pattern around the hip area was created using the grid-breaking techniques shared on New Elementary last month in this essential article.

Craving more Magic characters? alex_mocs creates another white hero with this haunting Elesh Norn model.

When ‘Trash Talking’ isn’t rude

The truth is, I would have probably shared this post just for the pun. But to do so would have skipped over ABrickDreamer’s great use of color, part usage and cartooning. Somehow, I think the personalities in each face match the bin style perfectly, with Mario warp pipes and a goomba face getting recycled. With the prompt of “trash,” the build comes in at the maximum 101 parts for the 2025 Rogue Olympics.

“Even the greatest LEGO builders are forgotten someday”

At first glance, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End looks like a pretty standard D&D-infused anime adventure, but all it takes is one episode to know you’ve found something special. The beloved series about friendship and loss and the passing of time is told from the point of view of Frieren, an elf who ages much slower than her former questing companions. Joffre Zheng pays tribute to the heroes who slew the Demon King in LEGO form. From left to right, Fern, Stark, Frieren, Heiter, Himmel, and Eisen are lovingly recreated in the Miniland style, each proportioned to match the anime and manga. I especially like the way Joffre captures Heiter’s signature pose, hand on chest. It’s a beautiful ode to a series that reminds us that no matter how much time we have left, friendship matters.

This Week in LEGO Bricks: Building with character! [Feature]

As March rolls into April, several LEGO events come to an end and reputable sites like this one roll out dubious news. With so many amazing builds and stories in the AFOL world, we’re grateful that ABrickDreamer is here to round up the highlights in one place. This Week in Bricks captures highlights from events like Marchitecture and the Rogue Olympics, as well as April Fools, but it was character builds that took the spotlight. From a mind-numbingly good Nien Nunb to the latest Eero Okkonen diva, builders created some striking and memorable characters this week.