Happy Brick Giving Season, BrickNerds! This time of year we choose to look to help others where we can. We think of friends, family, local charities, national charities and international charities and donating our time, skills or assistance to help others. Our LEGO community is no exception; our love of the brick, our passion for building, and our passion for giving can go much further. So today I wanted to compile a brief round up of the LEGO-related charities you can consider supporting. I'm sure I’ve missed some, so please add any others in the comments so we can have all the good causes included. Internationally, the LEGO Foundation works hard to improve the lives of children through education and play, partnering with many groups as a way to encourage building and play. The LEGO Foundation and UNICEF have partnered since 2015, focusing on child wellbeing and empowering children to become creative, lifelong learners through...

Best of BrickNerd - Article originally published December 2, 2022. BrickNerd is happy to present the second article in a short series on LEGO investing where we will analyze if holding onto LEGO sets for the long-term is a sound strategy to generate a profit. Safe build by Tom Gion and boxes by RAWF8, VIA ENVATO ELEMENTS Previously On BrickNerd… In Part 1 of this investment series, I conducted a review of the returns made from LEGO Investing by looking at the price increases of all sets retiring between 2005 and 2021 with 500 pieces or more. The annual return on investment from a sample of 826 sets was a healthy 11.7%, in line with an 11% return published in an academic study by Victoria Dobrynskaya. Image by rthanuthattaphong, via Envato Elements However, despite this impressive return, the sample took into account sets that had been sold and didn’t pay attention...

Best of BrickNerd - Article originally published December 1, 2022. Sometimes Nerdvember just isn’t long enough for all the incredible deep dives we have planned for you here at BrickNerd, so today and tomorrow we are happy to present a short series on LEGO investing where we will try to quantitatively answer the perennial question, “Is LEGO a better investment than gold?” 1. Introduction Stocks, Bonds, Gold, Art… & LEGO? In December 2021, the Guardian Newspaper in the UK published an article with the headline ‘Investing in LEGO may be ‘more lucrative than gold’. It reported on the work of Victoria Dobrynskaya, an associate professor at the Faculty of Economic Sciences at HSE. The research concluded that the annual return from investing in LEGO was 11% per year (8% in real terms) based on a sample of 2,322 LEGO sets over the period of 1987 to 2015. Image by 9_fingers_, via...

Last night was the finale of LEGO Masters Season 4 and we now have two new LEGO Masters as well as the set that will be made into an official LEGO set in the future. If you didn’t know, the winners will be flown to Billund to meet with LEGO designers with the winning build be turned into a new set. Before you read on, there are spoilers if you didn’t watch the show. The team of Christopher (DuckBbricks) and Robert are your newest LEGO Masters and their 8ft by 8ft build of the World Wonderliner will be displayed at the flagship LEGO Store in New York. Their build features a plane with three core icons of their most memorable travel experiences which include the Kenyan baobab tree, the Forbidden City, and the Colosseum. The release of the set won’t be out for at least another year or two but expect...

LEGO has officially revealed the new LEGO Ideas Polaroid OneStep SX-70 Camera (21345) which will be available on January 1. The set has 516 pieces and will retail for $79.99. You can actually pre-order the set starting today on the LEGO Shop. The Polaroid OneStep SX-70 Camera features a working viewfinder, the iconic Color Spectrum, exposure compensation dial, and a shutter button so you even can load and eject the illustrated photos. Also included is an opening film door to load LEGO Polaroid Photos in. There’s also a buildable Polaroid Time-Zero Land Film pack and three LEGO Polaroid illustrated photos. Lights, Camera… Build! The LEGO Group and Polaroid launch the new LEGO® IDEAS: Polaroid OneStep Camera for photography aficionados and LEGO builders everywhere! The LEGO Group and Polaroid has today unveiled the new LEGO® IDEAS: Polaroid OneStep SX-70 Camera. Originally conceived by LEGO fan Marc a.k.a. Minibrick Productions (@minibrickYT), bringing Polaroid’s...