Tag Archives: Hogwarts

LEGO Art mosaic 31201 Harry Potter Hogwarts Crests [Review]

When we reviewed 31199 Marvel Studios Iron Man from the first wave of the new LEGO Art mosaic sets a few months ago, we talked about LEGO’s long history with mosaics, going all the way back to 1955. Despite being a considerably different build experience from the typical LEGO set, mosaics have enduring popularity, and LEGO is determined to keep up with that market, as the second wave of Art mosaic sets has already been revealed. Two new sets are launching January 1, 2021, from the Wizarding World and Disney franchises. Today we’re looking at the first of those sets, 31201 Harry Potter Hogwarts Crests, which will retail for US $119.99 | CAN $149.99 | UK £114.99 and includes 4,249 pieces. The set includes pieces to build the crests for any one of the four Hogwarts houses, and four copies of the set can be combined to build a giant Hogwarts School crest.

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

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Next LEGO Art mosaics revealed as 31201 Harry Potter Hogwarts Crests & 31202 Disney’s Mickey Mouse [News]

Today we’re getting our first look at the second wave of LEGO Art sets, thanks to European toy retailer Van Der Meulen. Expected to debut in January 2021, the pair of new sets are 31201 Harry Potter Hogwarts Crests and 31202 Disney’s Mickey Mouse. The sets follow on the heels of the first wave of LEGO Art sets which were released in September featuring Star Wars, The Beatles, Andy Warhol, and Iron Man (which we reviewed). Like those sets, the two new mosaics include the pieces for multiple designs. The Harry Potter set has 4,249 pieces and can build each of the four Hogwarts house crests, though only one at a time. Brickset reports that four copies of the set can also be combined to create the Hogwarts crest, though we don’t have any images of that at this time. Similarly, the Mickey Mouse set has two options for either building Mickey or Minnie and we presume they can also be combined in some way. This set contains 2,658 pieces.

There’s no word on the price yet. The previous four sets each cost $120 USD and contained around 3,250 pieces, so we’ll have to see if the new sets keep the same price point with the Hogwarts one having considerably more pieces and the Disney one a lot fewer.

Don’t miss the other new sets for 2021:

Check out more details of the new mosaics below.

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Troll in the castle

Ethan Johnson is not only a really gifted LEGO builder, he is also an expert when it comes to adding light to his creations. His troll in the castle creation shows how adding light to LEGO creations brings them to life! And I am not talking about setting up a nice lightbox to take pictures of your LEGO creation. I am talking about adding actual functional lights to the creation itself.

Not only the lighting is excellent, but the creation itself is also very nice. Just look at those brick-built toilet booths and the little niffler playing hide and seek. LEGO Harry Potter has been around for quite some time now. Some characters and creatures got redesigned along the way. Some characters and creatures, however, did not. Sometimes a redesign is long due; sometimes an old figure still works perfectly fine, sometimes an old figure just needs to be spruced up a little bit with some new accessories and needs to be positioned just right so you do not see that there is a small plastic bridge between its legs.

Herbology class is in session

Since 2018 the LEGO wizarding world has been expanding via collectible minifigure series as well as sets based on the Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts films. All of the newly available minifigures and elements have really stirred up the imaginations of Potterheads and have inspired some great work. One of these exemplary builders is Kale Frost who invites us to sit in on a lesson at Hogwarts with his build of a Herbology classroom.

Professor Pomona Sprout

Kale’s brick-built greenhouse is a truly magical creation, the stars of the scene I would say are some of the newer elements he included as well as the latest Professor Pomona Sprout minifigure. Also from the second Harry Potter collectible minifigures series, is the potions book featured in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. He incorporates elements from other themes such as the geode from LEGO City Space and the teal headphones from Monkie Kid, both pieces also being fairly new. This vignette certainly makes me wish I was a minifigure, I could throw on those teal headphones and cultivate some mandrakes to whip up various restorative potions.

Mischief Managed

LEGO released the new Harry Potter Collectible Minifigures recently and Dishbrick placed the Weasley twins in the perfect setting: Brewing potions for their own practical joke shop. I like the use of the 5 point crystal and the power blast to show that the potions in the cauldrons are either exploding or steaming hot. Also the use of the back of the hidden side ghost faces as a bottled substance is very nice. But the best thing about this creation is the clever use of the lantern for the bunsun burner set up.

Six new LEGO Harry Potter sets revealed for summer 2020 with centaurs, Hogwarts expansion, buildable Hedwig and more [News]

LEGO has revealed six Harry Potter sets coming this summer, expanding the Wizarding World with new minifigures and scenes from multiple films. Hogwarts-based sets include the Astronomy Tower, the Room of Requirement (with new Patronus figures), and the Forbidden Forest: Umbridge’s Encounter (with new LEGO centaurs). The other three sets include Attack on The Burrow, 4 Privet Drive and a brick-built mechanical Hedwig.

These six new LEGO Harry Potter sets will become available on August 1st in the US and two months earlier in other select regions starting on June 1st (though LEGO will be offering pre-orders starting April 30th in some regions). In the US, the Burrow will be a Target exclusive and the brick-built Hedwig will be a Barnes and Noble exclusive–both likely to be available eventually from LEGO as well.

Take a closer look at each of the new LEGO Harry Potter sets coming for summer 2020.

The stairs actually move in this incredible LEGO model of Hogwarts

One of the magical aspects of Harry Potter and especially Hogwarts Castle is that ordinarily static things move. Pictures that in my house just hang there, with the people and things in them remaining frozen in time, always the same, in a wizarding house would be full of moving and talking, and even sentient, figures. And while we do have moving staircases in the Muggle world (we call them escalators), they don’t typically abruptly change their destinations; not so in Hogwarts, not so. The trouble is, we have not seen a single good moving staircase or moving picture in any official Harry Potter set. Fortunately for us, Jonas Kramm has filled the void with a brilliant build depicting both. There are innumerable gilt frames filled with magical chaps and dames, plus one of those moving staircases that so befuddled a young Potter and his pals in their early days of school. The moving functions are elegantly integrated and perfectly executed.

Hogwarts Magical Staircase

See the stairs and pictures move below

LEGO Harry Potter attends the Yule Ball with 75948 Hogwarts Clock Tower [Review]

When LEGO revived the Harry Potter theme last year after a seven-year hiatus, one set was notably missing: a minifigure-scale Hogwarts Castle. Of course, we did get the stupendous microscale 71043 Hogwarts Castle, but we’d come to expect a regular set labeled “Hogwarts Castle” as LEGO had done at least four times previously. However, this time LEGO had something much more grand up its sleeves. Afterall, there’s no way to have a proper Hogwarts Castle at minifigure scale without it breaking both your bank and your back. Beginning with the excellent 75954 Hogwarts Great Hall and continuing with 75953 Hogwarts Whomping Willow, LEGO is releasing a sweeping minifigure-scale Hogwarts bit by bit, with each segment modularly fitting to the next. 75948 Hogwarts Clock Tower is the third in the series. With 922 pieces, it retails for US $89.99 | CAN $119.99 | UK £84.99. It is available starting July 1 in North America, though it has already been available in Europe.


The revived Harry Potter theme has been playing a mad-dash game of catch-up to whip through the movies–because yes, the sets are based on the movies, not the books–in order to get a new generation of LEGO Harry Potter fans up to speed with all their favorite moments. Last year’s Great Hall was based on The Philosopher’s Stone, the first movie, while the Whomping Willow followed with a scene from The Chamber of Secrets. In building the modular Hogwarts LEGO has skipped right past the third movie, The Prisoner of Azkaban. Hogwarts Clock Tower is set during the Yule Ball in The Goblet of Fire, when two rival wizarding schools are visiting Hogwarts for the Triwizard Tournament. Continue reading

TBB cover photo for July 2019: Lumos Maxima!

For this month’s July cover photo for The Brothers Brick’s social media channels, we’re celebrating the newest wave of LEGO Harry Potter sets, which are available starting today in North America. We were amazed with this incredible version of Hogwarts castle by Hyungmin Park. Lit with hundreds of LEDs, the model is photographed so beautifully we could almost believe it was from the movies. Speaking of which, since we got a LEGO Batman Movie, a LEGO Harry Potter Movie would be incredible. (Psst, Warner Bros, are you listening?)

Harry Potter - Hogwarts

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Lumos Maxima! This incredible custom LEGO Hogwarts Castle looks like it could be straight from the movies

LEGO builder Hyungmin Park has brought something incredible to life. The many official iterations of the Harry Potter universe from LEGO have granted many builders the parts, concepts and construction ideas to achieve so much, and LEGO fans have responded with countless adaptations in a wide range of scales. But when I saw this new Hogwarts castle, I had to rub my eyes. I already have a love for both minifig and microscale builds, but here they work together to create a great forced perspective, all the while being impeccably lit with a huge amount of LEDs.

Harry Potter - Hogwarts

The Hogwarts Castle is as iconic as a pop culture building could be, and Hyungmin Park’s rendition is just stunning. The main structure of the building has been predominantly locked into microscale, with the odd exception of a well-placed minifig scale scene, reminding me a bit of the giant official LEGO microscale Hogwarts Castle. But this does two things: it allows the viewer to soak in some of their favorite scenes, and it gives some great forced-perspective photos. Having them completely lit up, only enhances the experience even more.

Click to see more photos of this incredible Hogwarts Castle

Two new LEGO Harry Potter sets are revealed featuring scenes from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire [News]

During the last week of April, we got the first look at the new LEGO Harry Potter sets scheduled for release starting June 1. Today, pictures of two more sets appeared online, 75958 Beauxbatons’ Carriage: Arrival at Hogwarts and 75965 The Rise of Voldemort. The sets will be available starting August 1, 2019 for retail prices of $49.99 and $19.99 respectively.

Click here to learn more about the new sets!

Harry and Draco duel it out as stars of the show

When it comes to creations shared on The Brothers Brick, it may seem like the brick-built models are the stars of the show while minifigures stand in as accessories. This is not always the case, though. For example, in Hugo’s model of Draco Malfoy casting Serpensortia, the architecture acts as a frame or backdrop while the minifigures take center stage.

Serpensortia-1

Don’t get me wrong, this backdrop is built amazingly well – from the stained glass window, to the arch over the window, and the mixed brickwork – but I’m a sucker for well-integrated minifigures. While there are some stock characters mixed in, such as Filch, Snape, Draco and Harry, my favourites are the other characters that fill out the scene. There’s a subtle art to choosing the right facial expressions and hair pieces to bring a character to life, and then you need to position them in a dynamic way to ensure they’re reacting appropriately and not all standing parallel or perpendicular to each other. Hugo has nailed all of that in this scene. The full range of expected emotions is visible, with characters upset, scared, or angry depending on their house. Yet this ignores the most cleverly placed minifigure of them all…the one that’s included in the building itself as a moving painting.