11 January 2018

2017 Skærbæk Parts Festival

Posted by Admin
On the last weekend of each September, the Skærbæk Fan Weekend brings together hundreds of LEGO® fans from dozens of countries for a few fun-filled days in a remote Danish coastal town. 2017's was the biggest yet, and on the Sunday morning New Elementary ran one of our 'live' parts festivals: a special workshop where, thanks to the LEGO Group, 60 AFOLs got their hands on some of the newest LEGO pieces to see what they could build within the space of an hour.



At long last I'm ready to show you what they made! Well, almost. Today I will introduce the parts I chose for the festival.



(Element ID 6195092 | Design ID 32932Fence 1X4X2 W/ Shaft No 1, in Black

The Ninjago fence is a thrilling piece of design. Aside from being attractive it has some surprising connections and negative spaces that we'll explore in the coming posts.

It comes in Black in 70620 NINJAGO City and 10739 Shark Attack, a LEGO Juniors set. 2018 will surely bring many more sets with it - in fact it comes in Warm Gold [TLG]/Pearl Gold [BL] in 70643 Temple of Resurrection (available at Amazon USA).

(Element ID 6198018 | Design ID 26007Mini Hat No 19, in Dark Brown

This is Garmadon's hat from The LEGO Ninjago Movie. I nearly didn't include it in the parts festival after realising that the top cannot connect to anything - very irritating - but I am glad I did, as it proved popular with the participants, as you will see.

It only comes in Dark Brown in 70608 Master Falls and 70617 Temple of the Ultimate Ultimate Weapon, and is also available in Black, Medium Nougat [TLG]/Medium Dark Flesh [BL] and Brick Yellow [TLG]/ Tan [BL].

(Element ID 6187620 | Design ID 32952Brick 1X1X1 2/3 W/ Vert Knobs, in Bright Red [TLG]/Red [BL]

Now for some universal pieces. You're likely already aware of this SNOT part - we've certainly mentioned it a few times already - but if not I'll point out that it is 5 plates high rather than a full 2 bricks high. This is ideal for SNOT building, or sideways building as TLG call it, because the height of 5 plates is equal to the width of a 1x2 piece.

It comes in four colours in over 15 sets.

(Element ID 6199908 | Design ID 34103Plate 1X3 W/ 2 Knobs, in Black

Everyone is super excited for the triple jumper and the tricky spots it helps with. Will it be of great interest in our parts festival or is it too general in purpose for people to find interesting uses?

The Black one comes in 5 sets to date, and BrickLink users have already logged three new colours for 2018: Bright Blue [TLG]/Blue [BL], Bright Pink [BL] and - hooray - Medium Stone Grey [TLG]/ Light Bluish Gray [BL] in the LEGO Star Wars set 75201 First Order AT-ST! (Current 20% off at Amazon USA.)

(Element ID 6196221 | Design ID 33909Plate 2X2 W/ Reduced Knobs, in Reddish Brown

Personally, I'm the most excited by this piece. So simple, but the lack of studs present many opportunities as does its small size.

It is doing well in recolours in neutral tones: initially it came in Reddish Brown and Black; it's already been spotted in White as well as Medium Stone Grey (in that same AT-ST set).

The official TLG name for this piece gives me giggles, what with its talk of reduced knobs. It's the first time they've happened to use that charming turn of phrase for a part, but there certainly are many other plates with reduced knobs, including jumper plates. I got to thinking about these and thought it might be good to have these on offer for the builders too - the Festival of Reduced Knobs perhaps - so I looked up what recent colours they had been released in.

Recolours


(Element ID 6192250 | Design ID 15573Plate 1X2 W 1 Knob, in Earth Green [TLG]/Dark Green [BL]

(Element ID 6186826 | Design ID 87580) Plate 2X2 W 1 Knob, in Sand Green

(Element ID 6186616 | Design ID 92593Plate 1X4 W 2 Knobs, in Dark Green [TLG]/Green [BL]

(Element ID 6173167 | Design ID 6179Plate 4X4 W 4 Knobs, in Dark Red

(Element ID 6192354 | Design ID 6180Plate 4X6 W 12 Knobs, in Dark Red

(Element ID 6186682 | Design ID 6205) Plate 6X16 W 26 Knobs, in White

(Element ID 6200046 | Design ID 6177) Plate Ø63 84 W 4 Knobs in Earth Blue [TLG]/ Dark Blue [BL]

(Element ID 6163991|Design ID 27928), Plate 2X2, W/ Design in Reddish Brown

Okay, this one is a bit out there ,in that it has many features other than reduced knobs! And even though we've covered this strange Minecraft piece several times before here on the blog, I couldn't resist including it in the parts festival.


There were other recolours available which I won't bother to list, as well as several boxes of random parts, once again provided through the kind courtesy of the LEGO Group.

You'll be seeing what the participants came up with over the next few posts.




My thanks to Jonas Kramm for assisting with planning the workshop, and to him and Chris McVeigh for helping present it as well as bringing some of their models. Huge thanks also to Sven Franic, Eduard Petrač and Kevin Gascoigne for invaluable assistance on the day! Special thanks go to LEGO Community Manager Kim Ellekjær Thomsen not only for providing the parts but chasing them down at the eleventh hour and driving them to Skærbæk! Phew.



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Products mentioned in this post were kindly supplied by the LEGO Group. All content represents the opinions of New Elementary authors and not the LEGO Group.

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