BrickJournal #86 Preview

Temples of Worship for Alien Gods People

Article and Photography by Nick Tyler (@captain.pigheart on Instagram)

Nick Tyler has been LEGO building for as long as he can remember. His first true love was Fabuland, but he also liked LEGO Space and Blacktron, as well as his brother’s Castle sets. His initial building was with those and lots of random bricks. His family also visited the original LEGOLand sometime around 1986-87, which was a very exciting trip.

Nick Tyler with some of his builds.

The following pieces are explorations of color, symmetry and texture, usually inspired by a handful of elements or striking colors. There is never a plan—the bricks lead the way until the structures are completed. These were displayed at the Museum of Making in Derby, United Kingdom from January 25 to April 21, 2024.

Drowned Shrine of the Piranha Gods

When LEGO released their Dots range, they introduced quarter tiles in gorgeous coral pink, a color I adored in LEGO Friends. This grew from a flat mosaic into shadowy construction to support the curves and whorls in coral pink and teal. The colors on black just pop beautifully, despite the structure being rather fragile. If you look closely, you can find various coral pink sea creatures, and even an upside-down rubber ring. The outer foliage all in rich yellow is made up of leaves, stars, minifigure heads, and hairbrushes…

Abyssal Gold Temple

New shapes and colors are always exciting, and I ended up with a lot of gold LEGO (again)—this started with the central mandala and attempting to make a circle. The gold coils always feel as if they’re moving slowly, ever creeping out of sight. Apart from the mandala, this is a fairly straightforward construction, expanding outwards with complementary colors and shapes, until I reached the pink-flowered trees, of course. The new five-pointed grass stems suggested a dandelion clock structure, and perhaps that idea gave direction to the whole temple.

It took some time before Nick started building as an adult, beginning with digging his old LEGO bricks out of the loft to share with some kids at his first job—building the Space monorail was delightful! This was the early ’00s, when LEGO started to get really interesting again, as it embraced franchises. He started picking up some of the early LEGO Star Wars sets (being a sci-fi and Star Wars fan) like the collectible miniatures and Jabba’s Palace, in a very casual but excited way, and inevitably, it began to snowball. For Nick, it felt like LEGO was making pretty and intricate sets for the first time with the Lord of the Rings sets and modular buildings. He had forgotten how soothing it can be to follow instructions—like jigsaw puzzles, but better. He needed something calming and relaxing to add to his collection of creative activities.

Nick is not a completist, so he hasn’t got a favorite theme— he bounces from theme to theme, picking up sets that look pretty and interesting to build. Although he loves Star Wars, those sets are mostly grey and wildly expensive, while the big modular buildings were a joy of intricacy and value to discover. He very much enjoyed Chima and was sad when the theme ended. Ninjago has also been awesome, especially the enormous Ninjago City sets, although he doesn’t have the room for the fourth set... or the second set. Monster Fighters and the LEGO Movie sets were awesome (Metalbeard’s Sea Cow might be Nick’s favorite set ever—at least until he looks at another set, like WALL-E). He may not have a favorite, but he does buy most of the Winter Village and modular sets. The Botanical range has some real treats too. He has an assortment of sets waiting to be built, from the Blacksmith’s Shop to Dreamzzz to Chinese New Year sets. If it’s pretty and detailed, he’ll probably want it.

Nick started building MOCs when he got a collectible minifigure: the Dinosaur Suit guy, to be exact. He wanted to build a mini city environment for the minifigure to destroy. The build wasn’t very good, but it started him building environments and buildings for the figures to inhabit, from adding to sets like The Lone Ranger’s Colby City Showdown to making little Christmas displays and making his own Winter Village Toy Shop, because he hadn’t yet acquired the set.

About ten years ago, he visited the Brickish Weekend (a LEGO fan event) at the National Space Centre in Leicester and saw the amazing heavily-greebled space work of Peter Reid and Tim Goddard (Peter’s LEGO Ideas Exo-Suit had just been released, as well as their book LEGO Space: Building the Future). It was the first time that Nick had really seen ‘adult’ LEGO building and was inspired. He still didn’t know what he wanted to build, though! It took a long time to find a style.

Since Nick wasn’t very good at following directions or planning ahead, he took inspiration from some friends’ story podcast called Flash Pulp, illustrating scenes from their episodes. It took several more years to realize that he was enjoying shape and texture and detail more than the subject matter itself. He really wanted to want to make space things and spaceships like when he was a child, but he discovered that he wanted to make weird buildings instead, now that he’s older.

Thunderbirds are GO! Building

Article and Photography

by Kevin Copas

Kevin Copas has been building MOCs for seven years, but as a young child, he was always trying to recreate what he saw with bricks. He started building as an adult as he saw LEGO evolve and improve over the years. It got him thinking: What he used to build as a child in the ’80s—could he improve and build better as new parts and colors were introduced? For him, the answer turned out to be a positive one.

Kevin’s main core of building is in military MOCs and TV-themed vehicles, but he’s happy to test his skills and try different things like animals and buildings, as they offer different challenges.

While the evolution of LEGO got Kevin into MOC building, attending brick events all over the UK inspired him to do more MOCs and show the skill he has building LEGO, as well as to inspire adults and children that their imagination can go as far as they wish and can achieve the impossible. Patience and perseverance are a must, and his creations demonstrate this. For Kevin, the outside world has always been an inspiration for him to build. He’s always looking for

Kevin Copas’ Thunderbirds collection.

something with a Wow Factor. For him, creating a real-life thing in brick form with a good representation sure is satisfying, but it can challenge him. Some of his best known MOCs are based on a Gerry Anderson series: Thunderbirds. Since he was a child, Kevin was always recreating the Thunderbirds Tracey Island base in bricks. Back in the ’60s, it was a captivating series that showed a lot of imagination and good morals. He was inspired to create brick versions of the Thunderbird crafts as well as the pod vehicles from the show. When he was a kid, he built them with incorrect colors. He now had the opportunity to recreate and revise the vehicles in correct colors—and to add that Wow Factor, make them in a good large size. Already his Thunderbirds have attended two LEGO shows in 2024 so far. Thunderbird 2 is by far the fans’ favorite, which fed into another reason to build: wow the crowd.

Building the Thunderbirds happened over a five-year period, with each vehicle being a year-long effort. It wasn’t planned out to be an annual thing.

Building Thunderbird 2

Thunderbird 2 is the most iconic craft and was a challenge to build. Here’s a look at the steps behind the construction of Kevin’s model.

Thunderbird 1.

Initial builds of the stabilizer and engine.

The fuselage starts to take shape.

Exhausts and stabilizer are added.

Landing struts are tested.

The shaping of the front nears completion. The support crafts are built to fit the cargo pod.

Thunderbird 2’s cargo pod under construction.

Thunderbird 2.

Building a Hobby... and a Wall! Building

Article and Photography

by Anu Pehrson

Most children grow up with toys and books and movies, comics being part of books. Superman, Spider-Man, Darth Vader, or Spock are normal everyday characters in their lives— but why am I speaking of children? Pop culture is important to adults, too! This is something I learned much later in life.

Growing up in India in a kind of traditional way, my exposure to comics and movies was limited. Think Asian Tiger Mom.

Comics, movies, fictional books, and cartoons on TV were all a waste of time. I would love to read mysteries like Sherlock Holmes or Perry Mason, but had to do it after everyone was asleep, under the covers with a torchlight. Amar Chitra Katha were the only comics available to me to read, which did make me an expert in Akbar and Birbal stories.

Fast-forward twenty or so years, and I moved to the USA and realized that pop culture references were everywhere! There wasn’t a day when I wasn’t completely lost during a normal conversation, because of a reference to something I didn’t know. Oh, I did know of Superman or Spider-Man, but if I was told, “These are not the droids you’re looking for,” I’m like, “What are droids?” and “No, I’m looking for my keys.”

Then the problem became more acute as an AFOL. LEGO and pop culture go hand-in-hand. It’s all good for a while if you’re building Architecture, Landscaping, and City, but a large part of LEGO sets and MOCs (my own creations) are based on some sort of pop culture. When I displayed at LEGO conventions, I realized that it was definitely sacrilege not knowing who Captain Kirk or ObiWan Kenobi were. Imagine what happened to me when I joined my local LUG (LEGO Users Group) to display at Comic-Con!

This was a defining moment when I realized that I had to educate myself. A friend’s 8–9 year old son took me under his wing and began teaching me. I watched all the Star Wars movies, Spider-Man, and so many others. I finally understood the difference between Star Wars and Star Trek, but it was brutal!

Honestly (and please don’t hate on me), some of it is just not interesting to me. I like Grogu now, if that helps.

And Mickey Mouse and Tom & Jerry are the best!

Master Yoda, like I do.

Since I loved reading, I came across George R.R. Martin’s Game of Thrones. That was an interesting story and very popular. It was the first time I was in-sync with current pop culture. I loved the story, but the descriptions of the locations and castles immediately sparked an interest in me as an AFOL to build scenes from it.

My first build from Game of Thrones was Pyke Castle, as featured in BrickJounal #45.

Being a GOT fan and a LEGO fan, building the Wall was an obvious choice, but, the Wall as it is, is boring. Besides, I would need a huge number of white bricks which are not easy to find. For some reason, white bricks are not very common, so Pyke Castle was completed before the Wall.

I started the process of slowly acquiring slope bricks of all sizes. At this time, I had committed to building the slope, brick and plate kind of rockwork.

The next step was to decide the parameters of the diorama around the Wall. Castles on the south side were very interesting to build, but many scenes in the show happened Beyond the Wall, so I decided I needed to build both sides of the Wall.

The different thing I did in this MOC vs. other MOCs is I mechanized the elevator. Yes, I know in the show or books it’s not mechanized, but I learned how to use power functions and gears. Yipee! I now know how to make things move.

The Wall.

Some of the forestry built by Anu.

The Castle Lounge Building

Article and Photography

by Victor van den Berg

Victor van den Berg does a lot—he works with children in afterschool programs. As ‘Vicbrick’ he teaches them all kinds of building techniques with LEGO. With them, he builds robots, future cities, castles and much more. He also has a small webshop with LEGO-related gifts. Additionally, he works as a ‘Professor’ named von Frobel for an organization called Mad Science. There, he teaches science to children and does all kinds of exciting stuff with explosions and smoke! He also does promotional shows for Mad Science.

Victor has been LEGO building all his life. His mom thought it was the perfect toy to play with. He recognized some sets from the ’70s he had, but doesn’t recall where they went. At the age of 14, he entered his Dark Age and stopped building when he started dealing with adolescent matters.

He returned to building when he turned 45 and started to buy and build some Star Wars sets, and immediately remembered the fun of building. A lot of stuff

Victor van den Berg:

was happening in his personal life, and Victor found out that building set his mind at ease and was therapeutic.

In terms of favorite themes, Victor has no specific LEGO theme. If he had to choose, it would be Star Wars, but the funny thing is that he hasn’t built much from Star Wars in his creations. There has been an idea of building something awesome for years, but it hasn’t worked out yet. He also has some Lord of the Rings sets, but he rarely does sets because he likes to build his own creations.

Victor started building his own models after seeing the most amazing things other people were building online. One day, he started collecting LEGO parts and at a certain point, it became quite a number of parts. He just started building. At the beginning, building is a process: he couldn’t really do anything wrong, and he learned a lot from it.

Joel and Jonathan Neuber: Building Pirates of the Caribbean!

Inez’ Raffesia leonardi.

lighting and movement for the cannons, as well as lighting for the cabin. The layout was completed at its first display at Skaerbaek.

The fort in the layout is a completely realized model, unlike the ride, where the only things visible are the fort walls. This was a result of Joel scratching his own design itch. He loved the star fort design that was common throughout the Caribbean during the age of piracy. All of the fort walls are sloped and at sharp angles to deflect cannonballs. Joel visited such a fort in St. Augustine Florida several times. Since most LEGO pirate theme forts resembled medieval castle design, he wanted to go for something more period authentic. The fort in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride isn’t a star fort, but Joel took creative liberties because he wanted to build one. It was a real challenge to build because none of the walls met at a 90 degree angle. On top of that, the walls are all slanted, so he ended up with lots of interesting joints.

Skeleton pirates!

Jonathan Neuber’s model of the Wicked Wench firing!

The dunking scene.

Finding treasure!

Building

Minifig Customization 101:

Article and Photography by Jared K. Burks

This BrickJournal article has been written to address the deficit in the LEGO-verse where Alice in Wonderland, a.k.a. “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” are concerned. LEGO has seen fit to create the following characters in Minifigure form: Alice, the Cheshire Cat, and the Queen of Hearts. This deficit is no longer tolerable; several of the most beloved characters in the book and animated Disney Classic are just absent. This will stand no more. It is the intention of this author to rectify this issue in a series of articles for BrickJournal to create and share “how to create” the key missing characters, including the Hatter, the White Rabbit, the Caterpillar, the brothers Tweedle, the King of Hearts, the March Hare, and the Dormouse. I encourage all readers to watch the animated Disney Classic “Alice in Wonderland,” which is available on Disney+. As with all literary works, I am behind schedule, so without further ado, let’s continue this journey.

“’But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ said Alice.

‘Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the cat.

‘We’re all mad here.’”

I believe the chapter title will proclaim the figures we are constructing today; however, for those unfamiliar with the work, please revisit the animated classic. I am using the 1951 animated film as inspiration for these additional figures, as it is this source that LEGO has released the three characters it has sought to create (Alice, Cheshire Cat, and the Queen of Hearts). The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party features an iconic scene from the book and animated film where we meet the Mad Hatter, the March Hare, and the Dormouse. Alice wanders into a Very Merry Unbirthday party where we first meet the Hatter, Hare, and Mouse. Alice wanders through the gate we saw the White Rabbit disappear through in the last chapter of this series. In order to create the Mad Hatter, March Hare, and Dormouse, we need a list of parts so we know where we are going, so we can go in a specific direction. Ultimately, what can we use from LEGO, and which parts do we need to create?

The point of any series is to reuse elements to help tie the series together; to do this, we will be reusing the collar, bow tie, and waistcoat I created in the last issue for the White Rabbit. This will make them appear from the same genre, and also make it easier to create so many custom figures— and honestly, they did this in the animated film, too.

Looking at our LEGO parts, these are fairly easy to gather together. There is quite a bit of design work to be done for the custom parts.

Luckily we covered how to create the bow tie and collar in the previous chapter on the White Rabbit. We need to create a hairpiece for the Hatter, a triple-spouted tea pot, a March Hare head, and if time permits, tiny objects for the Dormouse (hair, umbrella, collar, and tie). There is a cloth element that needed to be designed, or at least made in a new color: the waistcoat. I also need a card for the Hatter’s

A Very Merry Unbirthday!

“Yes, that’s it!” said the Hatter with a sigh, “It’s always tea time.”

The final element that is instrumental that needs to be created is the waistcoat. Luckily, these days custom cloth is a bit easier to create. Many have gone to using inkjet printers and a Silhouette or Cricket to cut out the cloth elements. I have done a variance and went a bit old school in how I created the cloth. Cloth frays, and you must add something to the cloth to keep it from fraying. I used paint to color the cloth and to keep it from fraying. I applied the paint with a foam brush on the white broadcloth while the cloth was resting on a glazed tile. The paint won’t stick to the tile that is glazed, and after getting a good coverage, it is merely about letting the cloth dry by hanging it vertically. Once the cloth has been painted and is able to be cut, then I use a Silhouette with a design that I iterated through many test versions to get the correct fit. I merely had to export these as a .png file and load them into the Silhouette software and cut away.

The March Hare.

Painting the March Hare.

Heads being painted.

Pulling a waistcoat from a pattern (right).

“Greetings, creep culturists! For my debut issue, I, the CRYPTOLOGIST (with the help of FROM THE TOMB editor PETER NORMANTON), have exhumed the worst Horror Comics excesses of the 1950s, Killer “B” movies to die for, and the creepiest, kookiest toys that crossed your boney little fingers as a child! But wait... do you dare enter the House of Usher, or choose sides in the skirmish between the Addams Family and The Munsters?! Can you stand to gaze at Warren magazine frontispieces by this issue’s cover artist BERNIE WRIGHTSON, or spend some Hammer Time with that studio’s most frightening films? And if Atlas pre-Code covers or terrifying science-fiction are more than you can take, stay away! All this, and more, is lurching toward you in TwoMorrows Publishing’s latest, and most decrepit, magazine—just for retro horror fans, and featuring my henchmen WILL MURRAY, MARK VOGER, BARRY FORSHAW, TIM LEESE, PETE VON SHOLLY, and STEVE and MICHAEL KRONENBERG!”

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99

#1 ships October 2024!

CRYPTOLOGY #2

The Cryptologist and his ghastly little band have cooked up more grisly morsels, including: ROGER HILL’s conversation with our diabolical cover artist DON HECK, severed hand films, pre-Code comic book terrors, the otherworldly horrors of Hammer’s Quatermass, another Killer “B” movie classic, plus spooky old radio shows, and the horrorinspired covers of the Shadow’s own comic book. Start the ghoul-year with retro-horror done right by FORSHAW, the KRONENBERGS, LEESE, RICHARD HAND, VON SHOLLY, and editor PETER NORMANTON

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95

(Digital Edition) $4.99

• Ships January 2025

CRYPTOLOGY #3

This third wretched issue inflicts the dread of MARS ATTACKS upon you—the banned cards, the model kits, the despicable comics, and a few words from the film’s deranged storyboard artist PETE VON SHOLLY! The chilling poster art of REYNOLD BROWN gets brought up from the Cryptologist’s vault, along with a host of terrifying puppets from film, and more comic books they’d prefer you forget! Plus, more Hammer Time, JUSTIN MARRIOT on obscure ’70s fear-filled paperbacks, another Killer “B” film, and more to satiate your sinister side!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95

(Digital Edition) $4.99

• Ships April 2025

CRYPTOLOGY #4

Our fourth putrid tome treats you to ALEX ROSS’ gory lowdown on his Universal Monsters paintings! Hammer Time brings you face-to-face with the “Brides of Dracula”, and the Cryptologist resurrects 3-D horror movies and comics of the 1950s! Learn the origins of slasher films, and chill to the pre-Code artwork of Atlas’ BILL EVERETT and ACG’s 3-D maestro HARRY LAZARUS. Plus, another Killer “B” movie and more awaits retro horror fans, by NORMANTON, the KRONENBERGS, LEESE, VOGER, and VON SHOLLY! (84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99

Donny Chen’s Golden Dragon! Building

Article and Photography

by Donny Chen

Donny Chen is known as the designer for the LEGO Ideas Grand Piano and other builds. He also is a piano teacher, tuner and technician. One of his most recent builds was a Chinese Dragon that was shown at Brickvention, a LEGO fan event in Australia earlier this year. Over six feet long, the model is made up of over 7000 pieces, of which 1300 were scales.

Donny has been building for around 14 years now, getting hooked with Technic construction vehicles. The first set he bought was the 8297 Off-Roader. From there, he started to build on his own when he tried to add a gear box to his Off-Roader. He also slowly started building models that LEGO didn’t offer.

Inspiration for Donny can come in real-life objects, or sometimes the shape of a certain LEGO brick. Building a creation can take a week to a few months, depending on its size. Most of the important parts of his models have been thought through, so he knows what sections can be done with LEGO bricks. Donny begins building digitally, as he doesn’t have a very large part collection. The digital build will give him a good idea of how many elements he will need to purchase for his model.

Celebrating the Year of the Dragon! Community

Article by Joe Meno

The Chinese New Year is celebrated by festivals and celebrations worldwide. 2024 is the Year of the Dragon and started on February 10, 2024. Three professional brick artists celebrated the year by presenting LEGO-built dragons online. One dragon has been on display on a traveling exhibition, while the other two were publicly displayed. Here are the stories behind them.

Photography by Sean Kenney, Robin Sather, Ryan McNaught, and Branko Dijkstra

Sean Kenney’s dragon.

Sean Kenney is a brick artist that is based in Amsterdam, with studio spaces there and in New York City. His work has been seen on displays and exhibitions around the world, including the Nature Connects exhibition. For the 2017 Chinese premiere of the exhibit, Sean and his team built a dragon that was an upsized version of a dragon that was originally built as a gift for LEGO China. The smaller dragon was presented to the Beijing and Shanghai team in 2012.

Some closer views of Sean’s dragon.

Robin Sather of Brickville Designworks, a LEGO Certified Professional (LCP), did a live build of a dragon from February 3–5, 2024 at Lansdowne Shopping Centre in Richmond, British Columbia. His dragon was mostly LEGO Duplo bricks, with about 95% of the 7,668 bricks in the larger size. About 200 were LEGO System bricks, for the eyes, claws, and some of the teeth. The total length of the dragon is two meters long.

The dragon was built by using a free digital file and importing it into LEGO Brickbuilder, a model design app used in-house by the LEGO Group that is available to LCPs. Robin then sized and scaled the file, editing the design pretty heavily. From the original file, the head was completely redone as well as all the legs. Robin also modified the “Pearl of Wisdom” clenched in the dragon’s left forepaw.

This was one of the rare times that Robin fully pre-designed a free-build, as he wanted a pretty specific shape. He still modified the build on the fly, shortening the dragon’s jaw. Another level of detail was added that he knew he could do without a specific design. Robin’s build time was only three days, so he didn’t have the time to add the fine detail for a permanent LEGO display.

Robin Sather and his dragon model at Lansdowne Shopping Centre.

The initial digital dragon model.

On February 16, 2024, The LEGO Group celebrated the Chinese New Year by hosting a life-size dragon build in Sydney, Australia. The dragon head and tail were built by LCP Ryan McNaught and his building company, Brickman. The body, however, was made of blank body segments to allow guests to make their own scales (based on an 8 x 8 plate decorated with colored DOTS tiles) for the dragon, creating the longest LEGO dragon ever!

Ryan and his dragon. Dragon head.

A look at the mouth and teeth detail.

The dragon’s eye.

Luca Scheller and Pande Kryopoulos:

Brickz Lab

the siege of ypdran

Galactic greetings! We are Bantha Bricks: Fans Star Wars. As administrators of one Star Wars-themed groups on Facebook, David Strenzler, Frank Averstegge and Eloi Parizeau witness amazingly creative builds by Star Wars fans worldwide on a nearly daily

This time, we are glad to introduce two talented MOC builders and Bantha Bricks community members from Germany: Luca Scheller and Pande Kyropoulos. Luca and Pande will speak on behalf of Brickz Lab, an international LEGO fan community, about their latest impressive community build: The Siege of Vodran.

Article by David Strenzler, Bantha Bricks: Fans of LEGO Star Wars Photography by Luca Scheller

David Strenzler: Hello Luca, hello Pande. Welcome to the Bantha Bricks Files! The LEGO Star Wars community has been familiar with your skilled Star Wars-inspired designs for some time. Could you please introduce yourselves and what you do?

Luca Scheller: Hello David, thank you for this interview! I am very grateful to get the chance to talk a bit about our collaborative project!

My name is Luca Scheller and I’m a 20-year-old LEGO builder from Germany. I actively started building MOCs in 2017 and have been ever since. In 2019 Pande, myself, and a few other builders created Brickz Lab as a Discord server that grew into the online community that it now is. Ever since then, we have had the opportunity to work on some IF YOU ENJOYED THIS PREVIEW,