On January 30, 2016, the Rambling Brick was born. Four years ago, give or take a couple of hours. Please pardon a little indulgence as I take a quick look through some highlights of the last 12 months.
Continue readingRambling Brick Turns Four
Month: January 2020
Questions About the LEGO Group’s Acquisition of Bricklink? Now’s the time to ask.
Since the LEGO Group announced their acquisition of Bricklink, lots of questions have come up. From availability of recalled sets and elements for safety reasons, through to concerns about controlling the primary and secondary markets, and implications for sellers and buyers, questions continue to surface.
Chief Marketing Officer, Julia Goldin, has announced an ‘Ask Me Anything’ (AMA) over on the Bricklink forums, giving community members the chance to ask questions about the acquisition. You can find the link here. You will need to be logged into Bricklink to add to the AMA.
Continue readingLEGO® DOTS Officially Revealed. [ANZ Pricing available]
In recent years, there have been rumours of a new jewellery/craft centred theme: DOTS. This range has been officially unveiled at the Nuremberg Toy Fair today, as we as a site in London, where Artist Camille Walala has just unveiled a house tiled with LEGO® Dots.
Looking like a fusion between household accessories and jewellery, the new DOTS sets allow you to decorate with a collection of plain and decorated tiles. We will see a range of bracelets as well as jewellery boxes, pencil holders and more, when the line is released in early March 2020. Read on for further images…
Continue readingSee in the Year of the Rat at the Temple Fair [Review 80105]
I recently looked at the 80104 Lion Dance, one of the sets released to celebrate the beginning of the Lunar New Year of the Rat. I said it was one of the most beautiful sets I had seen in recent years. Today, I get rid of the qualifier, as I look at the 80105 Chinese New Year Temple Fair – this is quite simply the most beautiful set I have ever put together. It is a set characterised by multiple small vignettes, a larger temple build, a novel tree design, and over a dozen mini figures. There are lots of printed elements, and precisely NO stickers.
The set has no elements specific to the Year of the Rat and, as such, could come each year, unchanged.
It is a set on the larger size of things, with a part count of around 1663. On opening the box, it looked as if I had some work ahead of me…
Continue readingWelcome to the Year of the Rat [80104 review]
When we got our first peek art the 2020/ Year of the Rat LEGO Sets, my first impression was that they were some of the most beautiful LEGO sets I have ever seen. The design aesthetic is quite different to that seen typically with LEGO City, Castle or even Creator Expert sets. What I must say is that I appreciate the work done by the AFOL Engagement team at LEGO, who made representation to the Global Marketing team last year – and as such, these sets are now available around the world – not merely limited to the Asia-Pacific region. When they became available locally, I headed out to pick them up, and I must say, I am delighted.
21321 LEGO Ideas International Space Station to be Released on Feb 1 2020
Christopher Ruge originally submitted this model of the International Space Station to the LEGO Ideas Platform back in 2017, and despite reaching 10000 supporters, it was not successful in the initial review. However,later in 2019, several submissions were opened for reconsideration, celebrating 10 years of the LEGO Ideas Platform, and the time has come for this model to take to the skies. The set is due to be released on 1st February 2020.
Continue reading21321 International Space Station
Ages 16+. 864 pieces
US $69.99 – CA $99.99 – DE €69.99 – UK £64.99 – FR €59.99 – DK 549DKK
*Euro pricing varies by country. Please visit shop.LEGO.com for regional pricing.
Celebrating 110 years of Old Trafford – Iconic Stadium gets its own LEGO® set
For the first time ever, Manchester United fans can now build and showcase a unique and authentic LEGO® model of the ‘Theatre of Dreams’.
10272 Old Trafford – Manchester United, 3898 Parts,
US $299.99 – CA $349.99 – DE €269.99 – UK £249.99 – FR €269.99 – DK 2199DKK AUD $449.99
Available 16/1 for VIPs at LEGO.com, with general availability from 1st February.
Historically, I have not been much of a sportsball fan. To quote the LEGO Movie “Go, local Sports Team” However, when I was growing up, if I had not been aware of any other English football team, here in Australia, I knew that Manchester United existed. Manchester United’s fans are spread around the world, and are passionate in their love for the club.
This year is the 110th anniversary of the the opening of Manchester United’s home ground, the stadium at Old Trafford. It may have suffered significant damage while being bombed in the Second World War. Most of the stands might have been redesigned and rebuilt several times, but it remains the second largest stadium in Great Britain- second only to Wembley stadium, and certainly the largest stand used for regular home and away matches. (the largest recorded crowd at Old Trafford was 76,962, in March 1939. The current capacity of the ground is 75879, and so will need to be expanded once more if this record is to be broken.
Continue readingBack to the Beginning- Backlog Building II: Microfighters 75228
Back when I first saw Star Wars, after the spaceships, one of the things that captured my imagination was the exotic location of Tatooine – a desolate planet, where people survived in an environment where they should not. We had strange indigenous races: the Jawas and Sand People, and exotic reptiles, such as Dewback Lizards. Somewhat restricted in their first cinematic outing, due to desert sand interfering with the animatronic mechanisms, they came back with a vengeance in the Special Edition, as the imperial presence on Tatooine increased with the addition of multiple CGI ships, troops and dewbacks. This is of course somewhat ironic, as they were employed by Sandtroopers as mounts in an environment where their conveyences were unable to work well, due to interference from the sand.
Of course the Sandtroopers are searching for the missing Death Star plans, carried by R2-D2, who accompanied by C-3PO, escaped from the Tantive IV during the opening battle in an escape pod. There have been a number of versions of the Escape pod released over the years, and dewbacks have previously only appeared in sets centred around Mos Eisley.
In 75228: Escape Pod vs. Dewback Microfighters, we have the first brick built version of the dewback, as well as a small version of the Escape Pod. this set has now retired from LEGO.com, but is still available from many retailers around Australia. Your local individual results might vary.
Continue readingStar Wars Backlog Building I: 75423 Slave One: 20th Anniversary Edition
I have been feeling a hankering for Mandalorians, following the series finale of ‘The Mandalorian’ on Disney+ last week. Unfortunately, I have been unable to secure either of the sets associated with the series at this time. So I had a look through my shelves and found the next best thing: a set with Boba Fett: the 75423 20th Anniversary Slave I. The LEGO® AFOL Engagement Team sent this set to me last year, along with other sets in the 20th Anniversary range (20th anniversary of LEGO® Star Wars that is). However, by the time I got those sets built, I was a little exhausted by LEGO® Star Wars – and so I put the set on the shelf for a while, awaiting inspiration. And today inspiration had finally arrived, so I opened up bag 1 and started to build . All opinions are my own.
Slave I is one of the spaceships from Star Wars most frequently represented in LEGO® form. Despite having less than 2 minutes of screen time between 1980 and 2000, Boba Fett’s spaceship has appeared in at least 10 sets – 1 UCS, 5’minifigure’ scale and 4 microscale, 2 magazine cover gifts, a keychain and two Advent Calendars. Certainly it has a distinctive shape, and is readily amenable to representation in LEGO bricks, at any scale. That said, none of these representations is perfect.
Continue readingBrickvention 2020 – Passes to Give Away.
It’s only two weeks to go before Brickvention 2020. Held at Melbourne’s historic Royal Exhibition Building, the event’s public exhibition will takes place on the 18th and 19th of January.
Once again, you can expect to see lots of great models by hundreds of LEGO fans from around Australia, New Zealand and around the world. trains, castles, spaceships, the Great Ball Contraption – and much much more,
WIN Tickets!
Once again, the Rambling Brick has been given some double passes and a family pass to the public exhibition on Saturday 18th and Sunday 19th of January (you choose the day)!
For your chance to win, leave a comment below, or on the post announcing this contest on Rambling Brick’s Facebook Page or Instagram. Tell me what you hope to see at Brickvention 2020 to go into the draw. You need to be able to attend the event in Melbourne on the 18th or 19th of January. I’ll draw the winners at random next weekend- entries close at midnight, 11th January.
If you don’t want to take chances, you can be tickets for your preferred entry time now, RIGHT HERE.
I hope to see you there. I’ll be around over the weekend: if you see me, come and say “Hi!” Until then…
…Play Well!
While you are here…
You have probably heard about the current Bushfire Emergency, affecting the Eastern many of the states of Australia. My friend Jay, of Jay’s Brick Blog is running a fundraiser for the Australian Red Cross, who are helping to provide relief during this time, and in recovery.You can read about Jay’s Appeal Here, and make a donation – he has some great prizes as well. [I have also contributed to Jay’s Prize Pool]