It’s coming up to January 1st. This means two things in the Rambling Brick Household:

1. A new Botanical Set is awaiting review.
2. The Knoller-In-Chief and I have just celebrated another wedding anniversary.

As such, part 1 was able to contribute to the sense of occasion associated with part 2. This year, the new year Botanical release, hot on the heels of December’s Tiny Plants is the 10328 Bouquet of Roses. This 822 piece set brings us a dozen red roses, along with a little spray of baby’s breath to break up the sea of red. It goes on sale with on January 1st for $AUD99.99; $USD59.99; €59.99; £54.99

Was this just the activity to cap off the week that began with Christmas Day? let’s take a look.

For our wedding anniversary this year, Ann and I drove to Ballarat, in regional Victoria – mainly to catch up with an Aunt who was unable to travel to Melbourne for Christmas. It was a lovely day, catching up and spending time reflecting on the year and what is ahead of us all over the next year or two.

After heading home, having an evening with the kids, the next day was spent dealing with a bunch of stuff (Ann), and plain old going to work (me). Another fun fact: by the time this article is published, I will be entering my 20000th day on the planet. If only Birthday’s were metric… this would probably be significant.

But I digress. The set comes with 3 small instruction manuals, full of trivia about roses, as well as a few word’s from the set’s designer. These are not the premium types of manuals we normally see in LEGO ICONs sets, but relatively thin paper manuals. Given the nature of the set, it is made easy to split the building tasks.

The set is really designed to be put together by multiple people: there are 4 groups of 4 different plants to build (a bud, a rose blooming and a rose in full bloom; as well as a sprig of baby’s breath.) If you are doing all of it on you own, I suspect it could become quite monotonous. Or a good way to find your flow.

Fortunately I had a couple of helpers. But before I could go any further, Ann knolled out the pieces for the set. There are 3 groups of 3 bags -each pair of bags seems to have the same contents (1&2; 3&4; 5&6)

Here they are, laid out for you.

The first bags focus on the bud. As well as many dark green connectors,we see some 2×2 discs as well as dark green curved slopes. The rose petals are build using a variety of different techniques: red shells as well as shoulder pauldrons from Star Wars. And, tucked away, we found the heart plate. Just perfect.

More Pauldrons appear as the flowers open up, as well as a few red mudguard elements. Dark green cockpit windscreen elements for the plant’s leaves.

The final back has the elements for Baby’s Breath in sand green, while we see red whips, mudguards and Iron Man masks from the more recent super hero buildable characters.

But I am getting ahead of myself…

The builds

The builds are relatively uncomplicated, but feature some neat parts usage, as the result of some interesting recolours. Each bag contains just the one type of rose. Because of the relative repetativeness of the process, I recommend building with others.

Bag 1&2 bring us the bud, built around a central SNOT core, wrapped in shell elements. with pauldron elements clipped on the outside. Some dark green tiles add to the effect.

Bags 3 and 4 contain the blossoming rose – the petals are moving out. Staggered wheel arches wrap around the core , and additional pauldrons allow the bud to spread out. The leaves are a little larger, drawing inspiration from spaceship cockpits.

Bags 5 and 6 contain the Baby’s breath as well as the roses in full bloom.

The baby’s breath is put together using multiple small flowers – 6 each on 3 stalk elements, attached to sand green foliage and alternating bars/Monkie Kid staff handle. This worked well either falling into the flow, of while having a conversation. Does anyone else find that when they are having a particularly repetitive motor task, that still requires some concentration, that any conversations that take place at this time can be remarkably honest? Apply this knowledge responsibly.

As the rose expands, the central core begins to unwind, represented by the recoloured red whip. The wheel arches are still there, but their shape is widened by the addition of a 1×2 curved slope. Finally, the petals around the outside use the mark element seen in recent super hero buildable figures. (Iron man, Batman, Wolverine, Antman, Captain America, and I am sure there will be more before 2024 passes by)

Each flower has its own distinctive appearance.

They sit quite happily in a vase, with the baby’s breath breaking up the monotony of red, red and red, with the occaisional touch of dark green.

So, is this an alternative to giving an actual dozen red roses? A quick survey of local online florists tells me that i can expect to be paying $AUD70-130 for a dozen stems. Presume these stems have flowers attached.

As a one time date activity, putting these flowers together will be a pleasant way to spend time together. As I mentioned earlier, when focussed on an activity, sometimes the barriers to honest conversation are dropped. [As such, supervising our kids while they were learning to drive gave us much more information about what was going on compared to dinnertime conversation.]

Indeed, the build experience needs to be shared, ideally sharing each bag together. Otherwise it can get a little monotonous. But that is part of the delight of these botanical sets: engaging the people around you. These feel more purpose built for a romantic date activity than the previous tiny plants or floral bouquet. And that’s OK. I found that the roses were easier to arrange than previous bouquets, if only because of their uniform colouring means you probably don’t need the same level of advanced design/aesthetic eye to put them together.

In conclusion, we really enjoyed the process of putting the Bouquet of Roses together. Sharing the build certainly enhanced the overall experience. And unlike the last time I bought flowers… they won’t be dead within the week. There are always lots of weddings (and therefore anniversaries) in January, to say nothing of the somewhat cynically placed Valentine’s Day in February – if that’s your thing. It’s probably about time to consider ordering them…

That said, as much as they resemble the real thing, they don’t have the same smell, and dont offer the same variety as other botanical collection sets. But they work as advertised. As for value for money? There is not the same price disparity between Australia and the rest of the world as we saw with the Tiny Plants. Even the US price is within 10$, while the UK and european prices are about the same price, give or take.

The 10328 Bouquet of Roses has 822 pieces, and will gon on sale at LEGO.com on January 1, 2024. It will cost $AUD99.99; $USD59.99; €59.99; £54.99. Please consider using these affiliate links – the Rambling Brick might receive a small commission and it will cost you nothing.

What do you think of the Bouquet of roses? Does it have a place in your home? An activity for Date Night? Or just doesn’t smell the same? Please let me know what you think in the comments. Or just say thanks to Ann for all the knolling she has done over the years!

I do need to say thanks to Ann for all she does to support me, and her work as the Knoller in Chief for the Rambling Brick. I wouldn’t be able to manage half the things I do without her in my life.

You can keep up to date with the Rambling Brick on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr (or just sign up for our mailing list) and find some extra content on Instagram and TikTok. And feel free to share this post with anyone who might be interested…

Until Next Time,

Play Well!