Tag Archives: Sculptures

Break free of the chains that bind you – and turn them into a boat

Aido K‘s latest LEGO masterpiece has left me lost for words. Well, not completely speechless – but this is a family-friendly website, so I can’t publish my audible reaction. My favourite genre of creation – if you can call it that – is people using the engineered properties of the LEGO system of parts in unusual ways. That’s where the idea for this build came in: LEGO bricks are designed to work under compression – that is, being squashed together. Aido turned that on its head, so this uses elements in tension (i.e. being pulled). So that boat in the middle is almost entirely shaped by chains under tension and the pull of gravity. It’s beautiful!

Chain Boat

That means the boat can fold down flat for easy transport – which is just as well, as this model made its debut at the Brickvention show in Melbourne over the weekend. Seeing the boat rise from the chains is very satisfying!

With 7,000 pieces, this golden LEGO dragon welcomes in the New Year

Next weekend, the LEGO convention Brickvention will return to Melbourne, Australia, bringing with it so many brick-built creations from the continent. Now we’ve seen some pretty impressive stuff from this show in past years, so it should be no surprise that a LEGO dragon of this scale will be making an appearance for this year’s con. From the mind of Donny Chen, this marker of the coming Chinese New Year 2024 can stretch out to 2 meters long and contains 1300 2×4 oval tiles as golden scales.

As impressive as the body is, with a flexible skeleton supporting all those tiles, the dragon’s face is also quite the marvel. Pearl gold has a fairly limited part palette, but Donny is still able to create some fantastic shapes in constructing the eyes, crown, and jawline of this majestic mythical beast. I particularly like his use of 1×1 slopes to create the appearance of small scales along the dragon’s snout and chin. I hope those of you able to make it to Melbourne can enjoy it in person.

The man in the Moon isn’t taking visitors today

You know LEGO’s 10315 Tranquil Garden? What if it was a bit more… Other-worldly? Might it look something like this Crescent Moon Garden by Nannan Zhang? I would say so! Nannan – formerly of these pastures, of course – was inspired by a real-world garden sculpture hybrid for this, and I love his take on it. I have to imagine it’s set on some distant world with floating rocks, giant trees, and a grumpy hermit who built a whole temple just so he could get some peace and quiet away from the world. Well, sorry, grumpy hermit, but I want to come and visit!

Crescent Moon

New year, new LEGO blocks

So, how’s everyone feeling about 2024 so far? We’re still writing threes instead of fours by mistake – not helped by all the 2023 recapping we’re doing. But while we’re deciding our Creations of the Year or looking back at our most popular articles, Kristel Whitaker has seen in the new year in a big way! She’s built some big LEGO blocks out of, er, smaller LEGO blocks. We could use some of these in TBB Towers to remind us what year it actually is. Although it won’t help us work out how much longer before we stop saying “Happy New Year” to everyone. New year, same problems!

Happy New Year!

Christmas is for caterpillars, too!

What do you think of when it comes to festive animals, either in real life or in LEGO form? Reindeer are a given. Turkeys are probably up there too. How about insects? If your answer to that is yes, either you’re getting 21342 The Insect Collection as a Christmas present, or you’re Nathan Hake. His charming caterpillar is braving the cold for some winter fun! Much like Nathan, this caterpillar is quite the sculptor – a smorgasbord of slopes and curved slopes on their sides make for a very convincing snow butterfly. Having an extra pair of hands clearly comes in, well, handy!

Clive the Christmas Caterpillar

Be sure to check out a 360° view of Clive on Nathan’s Flickr page. And Merry Christmas!

A build with heart, in more ways than one

We see all sorts of annual building challenges organised by the LEGO community, but right now there’s one being run by the LEGO Group themselves: the #BuildtoGive campaign. The task is to build a heart, tag it with the hashtag, and a LEGO set will be donated to children in need. It can be a simple build with bricks, or it can be as complex as this one by Maxx Davidson! Master Model Builder Maxx has gone to pains to create an anatomically correct human heart. You’ve got the arteries, and, uh… The ventricles, and… Who am I kidding, I’m no cardiologist. Still, I can tell it’s a stunning model for a good cause!

Anatomically correct heart for LEGO’s #BuildToGive campaign

You can learn a thing or two from a good LEGO model

Seeing a great LEGO build can take you on a real voyage of discovery. Dicken Liu‘s latest creation is a Japanese Tengu mask, which I think we can all agree looks fantastic with its dragon-wing brows and ‘stache. But it got me thinking what these masks were actually for; after all, I’ve seen a lot of them in comics or on TV without really knowing much about them. So I went to Wikipedia to do some research. But two hours have gone by, my tea’s gone cold, and I’m now reading about Japanese architecture in the Heian period. It’s very interesting, but I’m no closer to finding out what these blasted masks mean! Oh well. At least we learned what a good builder Liu is – but then again, we already knew that.

Japanese Tengu02

You’ll definitely hear this 8,000 piece LEGO Tremortusk coming

Man, I really need to play the Horizon series of video games. Now that might seem like a bit of a random ramble from yours truly (hey, it’s what I do best). After all, Horizon: Forbidden West came out 18 months ago now. The reason it’s suddenly on my mind is down to this mean-looking machine that Nicola Stocchi has built from nearly 8,000 pieces. This elephant-like creature, called Tremortusk, is apparently designed “to cull the human population”. I’m glad I read that particular piece of information. Had I only heard the name I would’ve guessed Tremortusk was a Pokemon or something. Somehow, I doubt this thing will take kindly to a Pokeball being lobbed at its head. So now I know not to try that. Every day is a school day!

Lego Tremortusk UCSThis isn’t the first creature in Nicola’s Horizon menagerie either – have a look at some of the others. They’re not all as friendly as Tremortusk here, mind, so tread carefully.

Oodles and oodles of LEGO doodles

One look at filbrick‘s colourful collection of LEGO critters, and suddenly I’m transported back to my school days. I had a nasty habit back then of not really paying attention to whatever the teacher was saying, and instead doodling in my school diary. Da Vinci it was not – mostly stick figures, actually. (I never did make it as an artist.) But occasionally, in really boring lessons, I’d start drawing characters in much the same way as filbrick has here. Mind you, I think I prefer this version, aptly titled “Doodle Art Burst”. I only had a four-way Biro to hand, but the wide range of colours on display here does make the whole thing pop. And there’s a good variety of pieces too. These guys use everything from coral and beehives to leaves and engine blocks to give them heaps of character!

Doodle art, burst

The mighty Giraffatitan takes a stand

What kid, or grown-up for that matter, doesn’t love the Giraffatian? When I was a kid we just called them a Brontosaurus, or Brachiosaurus if you were slightly smarter, but they have since been moved to their own genus by folks who are even smarter still. No matter what you call it, you have to admit this LEGO dinosaur built by Ken Ito is a magnificent sight to behold. It stands regal on its pedestal giving it the appearance of a trophy likely won for the feat of total awesomeness.

Giraffatitan

Just when I thought I’d experience total awesomeness overload, I learn this mighty Giraffatitan has a friend! It’s the Apatosaurus we featured last December now mounted on his own trophy stand. Please check out our Ken Ito archives to see what else we’re totally impressed by.

Titans on the Jurassic Land

LEGO Creation of the Week (#16): The Water and Moon Guanyin Bodhisattva by dicken liu

Every week readers of the The Brothers Brick Telegram channel choose the Creation of the Week: one project that impressed all of us the most. In a tight competition Dicken Liu grabs the last week’s Creation of the Week award! His most chilled-out Buddhist deity you’ve ever seen in LEGO form joins our pool of the best creations of the year!

Meanwhile, the new vote is already on! Join our Telegram channel to follow all the best LEGO creations, latest news, and, of course, vote for your favorites. See you there!

A LEGO memento mori

The imagery of nature reclaiming things is one that pervades all forms of art. Andreas Lenander has used his talents as a LEGO builder (and, indeed, as an artist) to bring us this latest take on the subject. This is an instance where repeated use of a single part really adds to a build. In this instance, the many olive green leaf parts give the effect of hundreds of little plants growing everywhere, while the vines made from whips drive home the overgrown aspect of the build.

Nature will prevail...