I’ve reviewed so many sets from the January 2023 wave of LEGO® Friends, I’m in need of some food and a drink... which these two sets will provide.
41728 Heartlake Downtown Diner has some great sandwiches for me, and 41733 Mobile Bubble Tea Shop serves a refreshing beverage which, according to my children, is made of a combination of milk, tea, flavored syrup and tapioca pearls for a chewy texture. I’ll have a coffee, black.08 March 2023
LEGO® Friends review: 41728 & 41733: Thought for Food
01 March 2023
LEGO® Friends review: 41730 Autumn's House
The buildings I have reviewed so far in the January 2023 wave of LEGO® Friends sets are all located in Heartlake City. Time to take a trip to the countryside and pay a visit to Autumn, who lives with her family on a ranch just a bike ride’s distance from the city.
03 February 2023
LEGO® Friends review: 41727, 41738 & 41741: For the Love of Dog
Today's review is for all dog-lovers! Join me on a journey through Heartlake City in search of canines in need of rescue.
27 January 2023
LEGO® Friends room inspection: 41739, 41740, 41754 & 41755 'Room' sets
The January 2023 wave of LEGO® Friends sets bring us forward in the timeline with the original group now all grown up and the introduction of a new group of 8 brand new characters. To get to know them better the theme gives us a look into their rooms with 4 new sets showing their hobbies and interests: 41739 Liann’s Room, 41740 Aliya’s Room, 41754 Leo’s Room and 41755 Nova’s Room.
The sets average around 200 parts, and are available for £17.99 / €19,99 / $19.99 / AU$32.99. I assume the rooms of the other 4 friends will show up in future?
20 January 2023
LEGO® Friends review: 41735 Tiny Mobile Home
Apparently it’s a new trend: Tiny Houses. On one hand, I like the concept: less room means less building materials, heating, maintenance and footprint but just thinking about living in one makes me claustrophobic. I’m not a fan of small spaces. I need room to breathe and move...besides, where would I store my LEGO in a Tiny House?
18 January 2023
LEGO® Friends review: 41729 Organic Grocery Store
The next set from the January 2023 wave of LEGO® Friends sets under my review is another shop: 41729 Organic Grocery Store. With 830 parts, it sits within the top 5 largest sets out of the wave, and includes some nice new elements. So, grab your cart and load up with MOC-feeders.
10 January 2023
LEGO® Friends review: 41731 Heartlake International School
The new year brings us a brand new group of Heartlake friends and according to the press release they'll meet each other at school. So naturally a school comes in the new wave of LEGO® Friends. We've seen 2 previous school sets (5 if you count the Art, Theater and Performance sets), and I’ll be schooling you today on the third: Friends 41731 Heartlake International School. With 985 pieces it's the second biggest set in the January 2023 wave, so sit up, grab your pencil or laptop and pay attention!
24 December 2022
LEGO® Friends review: 41732 Downtown Flower and Design Stores
After examining all of the new elements found in the January 2023 LEGO® Friends wave, it’s time to take a look at the largest of the sets, 41732 Downtown Flower and Design Stores. With 2010 parts, it's not just the largest piece count of the wave, it's the largest ever in the 10 years of the LEGO Friends theme. It's even the first LEGO Friends set to have a 12+ age recommendation.
I’ve been hoping for a Modular-sized LEGO Friends build, and this set comes close. Let’s find out if that 12+ mark is warranted.
22 December 2022
LEGO® Friends January 2023: New blocks on the kids
We're nearing 2023, which means a new wave of sets will soon be upon us. Over the next few weeks, here on the website and on our Instagram, Facebook and Twitter accounts, I'll be taking a look at 17 of the LEGO® Friends sets that have been announced. A lot has changed in Heartlake City, and this brings a lot of new elements. Let's take a look at those changes, and all the new elements!
02 June 2022
LEGO® Friends parts review & MOCs: 41704 Main Street Building
Products in this article were provided by LEGO®; the author's opinions are their own.
30 May 2022
Old Elementary: 10 years of LEGO® Friends
With LEGO® Friends celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, I wanted to take a look at what the history of this theme has brought to us LEGO fans. And I’ll start off with this statement: I love LEGO Friends! The models are colorful, detailed, and take place in ‘real-life’. They are great for city-building, and they have excellent playability. They also offer lots of ‘MOC-food’; with all the new elements and colors they have made available, Friends has made a great contribution to MOC design.
While LEGO City also offers great buildings, they are on a much smaller scale. The majority of Friends sets can easily be integrated into a city, whereas City has a lot of off-shoot subthemes that are much trickier to incorporate, like the Stuntz and Lunar Base series. And how many police stations does a city really need?
16 January 2022
LEGO® Friends review: 41703 Friendship Tree House
TobyMac (@toby_mac83) reviews the LEGO® Friends 10th anniversary set, 41703 Friendship Tree House. Buying this set? Consider using our affiliate links, New Elementary may get a commission: USA LEGO Shop | Australia LEGO Shop | UK LEGO Shop/for Europe 'Change region'. Products in this article were provided by LEGO; the author's opinions are their own.
LEGO has marked several theme anniversaries in recent years: LEGO Star Wars turned 20 in 2019, LEGO Harry Potter did the same in 2021 and LEGO Ninjago turned 10 that same year. For Star Wars there were promotional micro-builds and several remakes of older sets. Harry Potter celebrated with a relaunch of the Hogwarts modular sets and released golden minifigures of the main characters. Ninjago featured golden figures too, albeit with some added colours. With LEGO Friends turning 10 in 2022, I was looking forward to what LEGO will be doing to celebrate. Will there be golden minidolls? A remake of some classic sets? Or maybe a set packed with references?
When 41703 Friendship Tree House was announced as the 10th anniversary set, well, to be honest I was a bit underwhelmed. Yes, it’s big and looks great, but where are all the friends? Where are the 10 years of theme history? So it was not love at first sight. But I’ve been tricked by box art before; often sets look better in real life than in photos. So, eager to discover what I’m missing, I climb into the tree house.
30 July 2021
5x5 fest: Caz Mockett's MOCs
Caz Mockett (@cazmockett) is the first of the 5 contributors in our 5x5 fest! We sent her 5 LEGO® sets and asked her to use the new and interesting parts to create MOCs. Every Friday is 5x5 fest day for the next 5 weeks, so come back to see what our next AFOL built.
As a relative newbie to the New Elementary team, I have not been involved in a Parts Festival before, so I was eager to have a go this time. We each received a copy of LEGO® set 71746 Jungle Dragon from the Ninjago theme, 43184 Raya And Sisu Dragon from the Disney lineup, one of the eight VIDIYO™ BeatBoxes and up to two extra small sets of our choice, to use for our MOC festival. To save repetition, we covered the interesting new elements in the two largest sets in our 5x5 fest introductory article, and I took a comprehensive look at the new parts in all of the Beat Boxes previously. We were encouraged to look at the pieces in our sets as seed parts or to give inspiration, but we were quite at liberty to add additional pieces from our own collections to complete our builds.
23 July 2021
LEGO® Friends review + MOC: 41449 Andrea's Family House
Eero Okkonen (@eerookkonen) casts his critical eye over the architecture of LEGO® Friends 41449 Andrea's Family House today, before creating a brand new model inspired by some of its parts. Buying this set? Consider using our affiliate links, New Elementary may get a commission: USA LEGO Shop | Australia LEGO Shop | UK LEGO Shop/for Europe 'Change region'. Products in this article were provided by LEGO; the author's opinions are their own.
41449 Andrea's Family House - released in January 2021 - adds a new building to the series of homes inhabited by the main characters of Friends. Let's analyse its architecture and interesting parts before getting creative with the parts.
28 June 2021
LEGO® Friends reviews: 41677 Forest Waterfall & 41682 Heartlake City School
Saija Saarenpää (@saija_kristina) returns with not one but two more LEGO® Friends reviews for you today: the 93-piece 41677 Forest Waterfall and 605-piece 41682 Heartlake City School! Products in this article were provided by LEGO; the author's opinions are their own.
41677 Forest Waterfall
This small forest area beside a waterfall includes a wooden log that bridges both sides of the river where the waterfall lands. Included are two minidolls, a squirrel, and a few basic supplies for camping such as binoculars, a bonbon to roast in a fire, and a mug. There’s also a kick scooter as a means of transportation.
31 May 2021
LEGO® Friends review: 41684 Heartlake City Grand Hotel
Saija Saarenpää (@saija_kristina) is our brand new guest reviewer today, examining the new LEGO® Friends set 41684 Heartlake City Grand Hotel. Hailing from Finland, Saija codes and does graphics for her day job. She finished her Dark Age in 2014 via the Architecture Studio set, after which she was gradually lured back to the world of colourful bricks. Will you be buying this colourful set? It is released at midnight tonight 1 June 2021 priced £89.99/ 99,99 €/ AU$169.99; and in North America, 1 August US$99.99. Regardless of what you're buying, please consider using our affiliate links, New Elementary may get a commission: UK LEGO Shop | USA LEGO Shop | Australia LEGO Shop, for other countries 'Change Region'. Products in this article were provided by LEGO; the author's opinions are their own.
LEGO® Friends 41684 Heartlake City Grand Hotel is a big package, and seven-year-old me would have screamed for happiness if I got this as a present. It’s also super fun to build and is as exciting as the previous version of the Grand Hotel (set 41101 from 2015).
16 May 2021
LEGO® Friends reviews: 41687, 41693 & 41683
Eero Okkonen (@eerookkonen) examines 3 upcoming 2021 LEGO® Friends sets for you today. Buying them when they're released on 1 June 2021? Consider using our affiliate links, New Elementary may get a commission: UK LEGO Shop | USA LEGO Shop | Australia LEGO Shop, for other countries 'Change Region'. Products in this article were provided by LEGO; the author's opinions are their own.
Funfair magic, beachfront surfing or horseback riding? Today you can enjoy them all, as we review three LEGO® Friends sets being released in June:
- 41687 Magical Funfair Stalls - 361 pieces
- 41693 Surfer Beachfront - 685 pieces
- 41683 Forest Horseback Riding Centre - 511 pieces
21 April 2021
LEGO® Friends review & alt build: 41433 Party Boat
Lee (@citysoncreation) designs his own alternate model from a 2020 LEGO® Friends set for you today: 41433 Party Boat, which is priced 79.99€/ US$$79.99/ £74.99/ AU$$159.99. Buying this set? Consider using our affiliate links: UK LEGO Shop | UK Amazon | USA LEGO Shop | USA Amazon | Australia LEGO Shop, for other countries 'Change Region'. New Elementary may get a commission. The products in this article were provided for free by LEGO; the author's opinions are not biased by this.
It may be a 2020 set but there is no such thing as a bad time to build and review a LEGO® party boat, so let’s hop on with Andrea, Emma and Ethan to take a break as I examine for you the second-largest boat set in LEGO Friends yet: 41433 Party Boat. Then, I use its parts in my own creation!
14 December 2020
LEGO® Friends review: 41430 Summer Fun Water Park
Friends sets are well known for their abundance of vibrant hues, spot-on colour blocking and innumerable details. 41430 Summer Fun Water Park is no exception. This bundle of joy has 1001 pieces, four Minidolls and is priced at US$99.99/ £89.99 / 97.47€.