Minifig Posing Stand: Jonas Kramm's fantastic furniture

As soon as we saw the LEGO® DC Super Heroes Collectable Minifigure Series, we knew that we had to get our hands on the new little transparent angled bar included with the figures. We gave a handful of these new elements to three creative minds to see what they thought, and we will publish these over the coming weeks. First up is Jonas Kramm who analyses its geometry and possibilities.

Jumping, flying and fighting: these poses and many more can now be achieved easily by your LEGO minifigures. With the new element introduced in the DC Super Heroes Collectible Minifigure Series, called "Handle No.1" (6285587|65578) by The LEGO Group and "Minifigure, Utensil Posing Stand" by BrickLink, minifigures can strike a suitably super stance by connecting it to the bottom or the back of their legs. Regardless of which DC character you get, you get one posing stand and often even an extra one spare.

Minifig Posing Stand: Kevin Levell's Fishy Fun

We sent a few builders an interesting new LEGO® part and following on from Jonas Kramm's analysis last month, UK-based builder Kevin Levell reveals what he made of these small but useful angled bar and stud elements.

The new posing element (Design ID 65578) is officially known as "Handle, No.1", while BrickLink call it "Minifigure, Utensil Posing Stand, Bar with Hollow Stud" and Rebrickable have gone with the neat "Bar, Angled with Stud on End" and can be found in 71026 DC Superheroes Collectible Minifigure series. It looks to be another wonderfully versatile addition to the selection of small LEGO parts.

Minifig Posing Stand: Pierre-E Fieschi's starfighters

This year we have been examining an interesting new LEGO® part: the new posing element (Design ID 65578) known as "Handle, No.1", "Minifigure, Utensil Posing Stand, Bar with Hollow Stud" or "Bar, Angled with Stud on End". Following on from Jonas Kramm's and Kevin Levell's analyses, our final article reveals what gaming concept artist Pierre-E Fieschi (see his Instagram, ArtStation) created using the posing stands we sent him.

Mini LEGO TIE interceptor

I had the idea to make a mini TIE interceptor from Star Wars - which is one of my favourite TIE designs – using the 45° trans-clear thingies instead of the usual hinge/clip assemblies for the wings.

Iron Builder: Thomas Jenkins' stud shooter techniques

We have another Iron Forge contestant from the Iron Builder challenge revealing their LEGO® techniques for you today: Thomas Jenkins (on Flickr and Instagram), a Welshman living in Japan who has been building with LEGO for over 20 years. Last week in Round 3 the seed part was part 15391, the Minifigure, Weapon Gun, Mini Blaster / Shooter. 

On my first assessment of the Stud Shooter piece, there were two ways to use it in a model: take advantage of the bar that sticks out at an angle from the barrel of the shooter, or utilize the gaps and recesses that are usually used to house the accompanying trigger element.

Techniques using the angled bar of LEGO Mini Shooter With Ø3.2 Shaft, Design ID 15391

The angle of the bar meant that when used in conjunction with more shooters, it was quite easy to reproduce something akin to a spider’s leg. 

The shooters are connected quite simply with a 1x1 round plate with hole. The spanner seed part from the previous round also found its way into this model!

Review: 71485 Mateo and Z-Blob the Knight Battle Mech from LEGO® DREAMZzz™

A big mech calls for a big name and 71485 Mateo and Z-Blob the Knight Battle Mech is certainly a long one for this 1333-piece set. Though I can't help but think simply going with Mateo and Z-Blob the Knight Mech would have been enough. Surely 'Knight' and 'Mech' suggests battling is a given, right? We might never know, but by reading this article you will know if this LEGO® DREAMZzz™ set is worthy of the Round Table of New Elementarian Knights. 

Review: 43010 Nike Slam Dunk from LEGO® Nike

The Nike x LEGO® lineup has been all about sneakers so far, but 43010 Nike Slam Dunk switches things up with a high-flying twist: instead of building the Dunk you wear, you’re building the dunk you score.

Does the set lives up to its name or did The LEGO Group drop the ball on this one? Let's lace up and find out...

LEGO® MOVIE 2 review: 70827 Ultrakatty & Warrior Lucy!

THE LEGO® MOVIE 2: The Second Part is assembling in cinemas in February 2019, and we happened to stumble upon a few of the tie-in sets placed on the shelf early in a John Lewis store. We took this opportunity to review some of the sets before their official release starting with 70827 Ultrakatty & Warrior Lucy! This set contains 348 parts and is due for release 26th December 2018 in the UK priced at £24.99/ US$29.99/ €29.99.

Clearly, we have not yet seen THE LEGO® MOVIE 2: The Second Part but from the trailers and the various promotional information we know that it takes place five years after the end of the first movie. We saw some DUPLO characters appear just as the final credits started to roll and it seems those invaders turned awesome Bricksburg into a post-apocalyptic wasteland, now known as Apocalypseburg.

LEGOⓇ Marvel™ set review: 76269 Avengers Tower

We took a look at all the new elements present LEGO® Marvel™ 76269 Avengers Tower in our parts review. Now it's time to look at Avengers Tower, assembled.

 

Parts review & MOCs: 71832 Thunderfang Dragon of Chaos from LEGO® NINJAGO®

Set 71832 Thunderfang Dragon of Chaos is a March 2025 release from the LEGO® NINJAGO® theme, featuring a large creature build, a small side build and six minifigures. The colourful dragon is certainly eye-catching, but most of all I wanted to explore the potential of this set for MOC building. I decided to challenge myself further by creating only alternate builds of the set.

Review: 76344 Iron Man Mark 3 Collectors' Edition from LEGO® Marvel

Many LEGO® Super Heroes sets have relatively little to offer for hobbyists not interested in elaborate minifigures. Action figures are a staple in the super hero merchandise, and the recent efforts in this field have been varying in quality. 76344 Iron Man Mark 3 Collectors' Edition takes a more statuesque approach, but presents a whole Iron Man instead of mere bust or a helmet. As a human character build, it looks like one of the best so far.

Review: 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion from LEGO® Marvel

LEGO® Marvel is taking us back to school in the next 18+ set 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion. This highly anticipated set contains 3093 pieces and a host of new mutant minifigures. Read on to see if this LEGO version of Professor Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters makes the grade...

Interview: LEGO® 10353 Williams Racing FW14B with designer Gus McLaren

We just published Zach's review of LEGO® Icons 10353 Williams Racing FW14B and Nigel Mansell but the set was actually revealed to us in September 2024 during Fan Media Days, where Tim Johnson sat down with designer Gus McLaren to talk about the set.

International LEGO® Day 2025: moulding knowledge quiz

28 January marks the "birthday" of the LEGO® brick — the anniversary of the day in 1958 when the patent of the LEGO System 2x4 brick was submitted to the trademark office in Denmark. This is celebrated today as International LEGO Day.

As a way to celebrate as only New Elementary can, we decided to test your LEGO moulding knowledgeby posing a series of questions on our social media asking you to identify items in an image. Here are the questions and also the answers, so let's see how many you have right.

Parts review: 71048 LEGO® Minifigures Series 27

I might be a bit late in saying, but LEGO® Minifigures are a bit of a phenomenon. Fifteen years, 47 actual series when including licensed themes, and 727 figures – many of which it would be difficult to imagine ever existing outside of this theme.

There have been hundreds of unique parts introduced, some of which have made it into standard sets by virtue of their usefulness. The posing stand, aka Bar 1L with Angled Hollow Stud (65578) would definitely be a candidate for that. Will Series 27 contain a game-changer of similar importance?

"Kill Teal" - the winners

It's all over! 54 builders submitted 79 entries that imagined how the newly returned LEGO® colour called teal could be killed off again, given that Mark Stafford's last attempt in 2006 clearly failed. Here are all the entries in one image:

Which of course means we had to judge winners; always a painful task but especially difficult when the entries all excelled in different ways - their originality, humour, clever ideas and of course nice piece usage. Thank you so much to everyone that entered, creating so many smiles for us and New Elementary readers. Now read on to find out who was picked for the prizes...

Tipper Ends: Eero Okkonen's Aurora Sievert & Hurricane III

Yesterday, Eero Okkonen examined in great detail the history and geometry of the 'Tipper End Family' of LEGO® pieces, especially Vehicle, Tipper End Flat with Pins (Design ID 3145) and Vehicle, Tipper End Sloped (3436). Today he reveals this never-before-published model he built in February using tipper ends, but first he takes us through earlier models where he utilised these unusual parts that were introduced five decades ago.  

Previous Builds

A more mathematical approach to tipper ends is a new and exciting world to me, but I’ve used them few times before, mostly as armour shells or clothing, something akin to Constraction shells.

LEGO® City review: 60307 Wildlife Rescue Camp

Ben Davies (@ProfBrickkeeper) talks to the animals, and dinghy, in LEGO® City 60307 Wildlife Rescue Camp. Don't forget Black Friday/Cyber Monday weekend starts 26 November 2021! Please consider following New Elementary's affiliate links; we may earn a commission. LEGO.com USA | LEGO.com Australia | LEGO.com UK (for Europe, 'Change region'. Products in this article were provided by LEGO; the author's opinions are their own.

Released earlier this year, the LEGO® City Wildlife Rescue subtheme caught the interest of many for its location shift to the African savanna, and the animals it introduced. The largest of the sets, 60307 Wildlife Rescue Camp provides a nice distillation of the subtheme, featuring many of the most interesting new elements in a single set.

LEGO® Marvel Super Heroes set review: 76178 Daily Bugle

Thomas Jenkins (@thomas_jenkins_bricks) completes his 2-part coverage of LEGO® Marvel Super Heroes 76178 Daily Bugle today, analysing the build. It is available now priced €299.99/ £274,99/ $299,99/ 499.99 AUD/ 399.99 CAD. Please consider using our affiliate links to purchase, 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.

76178 Daily Bugle is unlike any LEGO set I’ve built before. It’s part modular building, part playset, part diorama and it does all of these things really well. The accompanying host of minifigures are integrated into the design of the building itself, and sometimes quite spectacularly, too - as is the case of the Green Goblin bursting through the window of the second floor.

I analysed its pieces last time but there’s a ton of interesting building techniques, parts usage, and little details scattered throughout the build to still discuss. We’ll work our way up the building and take a look at them.

8-Year Old Elementary: Celebr8 with Kev Levell

It's our 8th anniversary of publishing LEGO® articles today! As part of our celebrations, here's a fun article from Kev Levell.

Congratulations to Tim on 8 phenomenal years running New Elementary. In honour of those 8 years, I have picked 8 “parts”, most of these were (as usual) sitting on my build table, among the essential group of parts that I more often than not tend to have to hand, just to see how they might fit or what they will look like in whatever it is I’m building. Another day, it might have been a slightly different 8!

LEGO® part 4042: Curved Bar with Axle End and 1 x 1 Round Plate

Thomas Jenkins thought it was time to take a closer look at an interesting new element that has been appearing in more and more sets since its release earlier this year.

Bar Curved with Axle End and 1 x 1 Round Plate is a bended element we first noticed in two LEGO® Marvel sets earlier this year, but do you know which set it was originally designed for? Read on to find out more...