LEGO® Apollo 11 Lander: Jamie Berard interview

At the Recognised LEGO® Fan Media Days event in Billund recently we spoke to Creator Expert Design Manger Specialist Jamie Berard who introduced their newest set, 10266 NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander, which we reviewed a few days ago.

This looks incredible, Jamie. Who designed the set?

Jamie: Lars Joe was the designer, he normally works on Architecture but he also did the Winter Village firehouse, that was his first Creator Expert model and now this is his second one. You might also see some influence of Mike Psiaki, he did some of the original configuration for this and the triangulation on the legs. Then, when Lars Joe was working with it further, I pitched in a little bit on the upper part in the locking mechanism. We all couldn't help ourselves but to want to play with certain parts! But it's definitely Lars Joe.

LEGO® Creator Expert review: 10266 NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander

Revealed today, the spectacular LEGO® Creator Expert 10266 NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander comes with 1087 pieces, and will be available June 1st 2019 for 89.99€/ US$99.99. Sven Franic took this modular module for a spin, and had a blast!

The LEGO Group (TLG) has a longstanding relationship with NASA which has ensured minifigures are no strangers to space travel. They once sent three minfigures as far as Jupiter, just for fun. If the number of NASA-themed LEGO Ideas proposals are anything to go by, there seems to be a recent increase in popularity of non-fictional space sets. The LEGO Ideas 21309 Apollo 11 Saturn V rocket is great for demonstrating the different rocket stages and modules, but despite its impressive size, the most iconic landing module which touched the surface of the moon was tiny compared to the entire vessel.

75253 LEGO® Star Wars™ BOOST Droid Commander announced

For this year's Star Wars Day, The LEGO Group have just revealed a really cute new set, 75253 LEGO® Star Wars™ BOOST Droid Commander. This is the first time the company have combined their LEGO BOOST coding technology with a licensed product.

The set has 1,177 pieces and will be available globally on 1st September 2019 to tie in with the release of Star Wars Episode IX. Prices were not provided.

The set comes with the Mouse Droid, R2-D2 and the GONK Droid – "with their own personalities, skills, and authentic Star Wars sounds and music" – in order for each of them to complete over 40 missions.

There's a new mould on R2's head; 4x4 quarter domes. Teal fans will be on a mission to get their hands on those nice new large parts in Bright Bluish Green [TLG]/ Dark Turquoise [BL] – I believe I see 2x14 plates and an 8x16 tile.

LEGO® Overwatch review: 75975 Watchpoint: Gibraltar

Our second LEGO® Overwatch review takes a look at the new and interesting elements in 75975 Watchpoint: Gibraltar. The largest set in the theme, it contains 730 elements, four minifigures and costs £79.99 / $89.99 / 89.99€ and has been available since January 2019.

There are some interesting new angles in this set and a few elements appear for the first time in a new colour, so let's take a closer look.

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 4

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull.

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners tomorrow, we are showing you all 53 entries received – here is the final bunch. Missed part 1? Start here.

Electric rock guitar

By
Csaba Toth

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 3

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull (BUSH).

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners, we will show you all 53 entries received over the course of the next few days. Missed part 1? Start here.

Honored Adventurer

By
Big Stannis

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 2

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull.

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners, we will show you all 53 entries received over the course of the next few days. Missed part 1? Start here.

Hera Customs Official

By
Oscar Cederwall (o0ger)

I ordered six 43979 and started combining them in different ways. I liked the shape I got from combining two of the parts stud-to-stud. I started attaching bricks on the outside of the parts and this is the result. There are two engines with two 43979 each, and there are also two 43979 in the front of the fuselage.

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 1

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull.

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners, we will show you all 53 entries received over the course of the next few days.

Anatomical Mouth Model

By
Quoting

A model of the mouth and teeth like you would find at the dentist.

A long time ago... LEGO® Star Wars™ began

Billund, 9th April 2019: Twenty years ago, in a galaxy far, far away, the LEGO® Star Wars™theme began and has remained one of the most popular franchises ever since. Today, the LEGO Group is celebrating the 20th anniversary of the much-loved theme which now includes around 700 different sets and over 1,000 minifigures.

They've provided us with some fascinating pictures to share with you, so we thought it would be fun to look back to a time when Star Wars was the theme introducing new LEGO elements and breaking the mould. All images are © The LEGO Group unless otherwise attributed.

Interesting LEGO Star Wars Element Facts

The 1999 Jar Jar Binks minifigure was the first ever to have a unique LEGO head sculpt. These are a couple of prototype versions of Jar Jar's moulded head that show the development process.

Old Elementary: Duncan gets fly with Insectoids

One of our New Elementary parts festival builders, Duncan Lindbo, casts his mind back to an old LEGO® element that may well be familiar to fans who were youths during the 1990s. Remember the Insectoids? Well, Duncan does.

For many AFOLs, the late 1990s were a low point in set design. They think there were too many overly specialized parts, and they’re not entirely wrong… but because of that, there’s a lot of interesting parts that tend to get ignored by the AFOL community. Today, we’re going to explore a couple of Transparent Blue [TLG]/Trans-Dark Blue [BL] elements from the Insectoids line (1998-1999).

Contest: Build and Fix inspiration from Kev Levell

We are running a LEGO® building contest going on at the moment using the new spaceship hull piece from LEGO 4+ sets as the seed part. Prizes are The LEGO® Movie 2 sets. Hopefully your experiments are well underway and we've received many entries already. We're not revealing any until after the contest ends (8 April 2019) however our friend Kev Levell has sent us something to inspire you. (He has decided not to enter the contest.)

Now, although Kev has built us a spaceship don't think that this is solely a spaceship-building contest. Indeed we are primarily looking for inventive uses of this new element, so while spaceships are of course welcome you may prefer to build something quite different. 

I was lucky enough to get The LEGO® Movie 2 set 70821 Emmet and Benny's ‘Build and Fix' Workshop before Christmas. I immediately loved the new hull part (Design ID 43979) and ordered a couple extra of them as soon as I could. Affectionately, I’ve been thinking of this piece as Big Ugly Space Hull (BUSH), which amused me. Sorry.

I had been tinkering with a spaceship design using 43979 when I saw New Elementary post the “Build and Fix” competition calling for models that used this new element as a seed part. This is a very quick, very simple model using three of them to show how cool the BUSH is (for Classic Space enthusiasts at least).

LEGO® MOVIE 2 review: 70830 Sweet Mayhem’s Systar Starship!

Our series of set reviews of THE LEGO MOVIE 2: The Second Part continues today with 70830 Sweet Mayhem’s Systar Starship! Ben Davies (ProfessorBrickkeeper) returns to examine another bumper collection of exciting parts.

One of the first sets revealed for the toy line and featuring prominently in the initial trailer for the film, 70830 Sweet Mayhem’s Systar Starship! has been one of the most anticipated sets for The LEGO Movie 2, thanks in no small part to its unusual design, wide assortment of teal bricks, and inclusion of several new-for-2019 elements.

Before examining all the new parts, let’s take a look at the construction of the ship and the finished model.

2018 Parts Fest #1: Luc Byard's The Alchemist

One of the 2018 LEGO® elements that we sent to builders to investigate was the new minifigure neck bracket with four bar attachments (Element ID 6215458 | Design ID 36452). One of our talented buiders, Luc Byard, used it to create a walker mech and has now come up with another interesting creation based upon this unusual part.

This build came out of looking for a way to connect the two shafts that are at 90° to each other. ‘Easy enough,’ I said to myself but the placement is not as convenient as I expected. It’s a tight fit and I think I’m pushing tolerances but I managed to secure them.

LEGO® MOVIE 2 review: 70821 Emmet and Benny's ‘Build and Fix' Workshop!

THE LEGO® MOVIE 2: The Second Part is assembling in cinemas in February 2019, and the tie-in sets have just been released in stores. 70821 Emmet and Benny's ‘Build and Fix' Workshop! is the second set we are taking a closer look at. It has 117 parts, including new Emmet and Benny minifigures, and is now available priced £17.99/ 19,99€/ US$19.99 at Amazon USA and Amazon UK as well as all usual retailers. 

70821 Emmet and Benny's ‘Build and Fix' Workshop! is particularly aimed at preschoolers and young builders. Such sets were previously branded as LEGO® Juniors, now it seems they just carry a large 4+ age mark. The Juniors moniker was introduced for kids who knew they were getting too old for DUPLO and wanted "grown up LEGO"; perhaps the name was dropped as they didn't want something marked as junior either?

Conversely, it seems no grown up is too old for this set.

LEGO® Minecraft animals: Cat and Rabbit

Continuing his challenge to use the LEGO® Minecraft animal heads in original ways, Jonas Kramm takes a look at another two animals.

In today’s lesson about Minecraft animals we will take a closer look at the moulds of the cat and the rabbit. (If you missed my last class featuring the silverfish and chicken parts, you can catch up here.) We also have a guest builder, my friend Cole Blaq!

2018 Parts Fest #1: Tim Goddard's BrickHeadz (and spaceships)

We sent a varied selection of new LEGO® parts from 2018 to some fan builders to build at home, and Tim Goddard (co-author of LEGO Space: Building the Future, plug plug) not only built at home but also down the boozer. Following on from his main builds that we posted two months ago, here are some fun extras.

On the second Monday of every month, London AFOLs hold a gathering in a pub near Euston station. Prosaically, the meeting after I was given this parts selection, London AFOLs had a meetup and that month it was a BrickHeadz-themed evening.

I went prepared, taking this sub-build which uses the interesting hooped minifigure accessory (Element ID 6207840|Design ID 35485) which is only found in LEGO Super Heroes 76100 Royal Talon Fighter Attack and 76103 Corvus Glaive Thresher Attack.

Using the healthy stock of parts provided at the pub I ended the evening with this post-apocalyptic version of myself...

2018 Parts Fest #1: Luc Byard's Walker

We sent a varied selection of new LEGO® parts to some expert fan builders for them to explore techniques and models to share with you. Here's one from Luc Byard (Flickr).

I love Tim; no-one can give you some really awkward LEGO® parts and say ‘build something with those’ quite like he can. The latest bunch included that new minifigure neck bracket with 4 bars (Element ID 6215458 | Design ID 36452) which looks cool… then you try and build with it!

My finished build is a micro Robotech-style walker. And with all that black, I just had to pair it with trans-yellow to give it a Blacktron scheme.

2018 Parts Fest #1: Steve Guinness in space

We sent a varied selection of new LEGO® parts to some fan builders to explore techniques and models. This time we have the talented Steve Guinness: one half of the team who won Series 1 of Channel 4's LEGO Masters who now undertake commissions as The Brick Guys.

Clockwork Robots 

When I saw the 1x3 jumper plate (Design ID 34103) I liked the unusual pattern on the underside, as it has no anti-studs or pegs. The tiny triangles reminded me of teeth so I came up with these Clockwork Robots.

LEGO® BrickHeadz: Harry Potter, Frozen and Star Wars

The LEGO® BrickHeadz theme continues its domination of all known and imagined universes by bringing us collectable characters from some of today's most popular franchises. Sven Franic sees how this latest batch get along, including its introduction of a new template for smaller BrickHeadz characters.





I had the chance to review the first batch of BrickHeadz more than a year ago. I never would have guessed at the time that Marcos Bessa’s standard for chibi characters would gain so much popularity. There is a high standard of quality behind the sets, considering the price range. Despite their blocky outer appearance, it takes a lot of tiny slopes and tiles to capture the spirit of a character. All decorations are printed and applied generously, and the sets tend to come with a lot of freshly re-coloured pieces.



LEGO® Ideas 21311 Voltron: the parts

Chris McVeigh takes a look at what makes up Voltron, Defender of the Universe; the newest set from LEGO® Ideas. Set 21311 has 2,321 pieces – including lots of silver ones – and is now available priced £159.99 / US$179.99 / 179.99€.

Leandro (Lendy) Tayag’s winning LEGO® Ideas submission blasts its way to market as 21311 Voltron. The towering robot defender comes to life by combining five mechanized lions, each which is a separate model in this set. So how does Voltron stack up (both literally, and in terms of new elements)? Let’s take a closer look!