Over the past three years, BrickNerd has published nearly a thousand in-depth articles about LEGO and the fan community. Our international crew of LEGO superfans has worked hard to get nerdy about the bricks, share stories about the people behind the builds, and highlight the best the LEGO community has to offer. And we want you to join the team! But how does one become a BrickNerd, you ask? There are several meaningful ways. Become a BrickNerd Contributor As you can tell, we are an eclectic bunch of BrickNerds with stories to tell. That variety and depth of culture are what bring together the LEGO community with our common love for the brick. But we could always learn more from each other—from different cultures and backgrounds—and share the vast knowledge about this LEGO hobby that we all love so much. Do you have an eye for finding some of the most...

LEGO has just dropped two new gift with purchase sets with the LEGO Disney 100 Mini Steamboat Willie (40659) and the Houses of the World 4 (40599). To get the Steamboat, you’ll need a $100 purchase in Disney properties which include Marvel and Star Wars. The Houses of the World 4 does overlap and requires a $250 general purchase. Considering LEGO has expanded the requirements for the Steamboat, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Steamboat sells out in a few days. Both promotions will run until the end of October. As a Rakuten/Linkshare Affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases. The post LEGO Disney 100 Mini Steamboat Willie (40659) and Houses of the World 4 (40599) GWPs Live on LEGO Shop appeared first on The Brick Fan. Original linkOriginal author: Allen "Tormentalous" Tran

Amazon has dropped the price of the LEGO Ideas Tree House (21318) to an absurdly low price at 42% off. It is now priced at $144.23 which is the lowest price I’ve seen ever for it. It has been rumored that the set will be retiring at the end of 2023 and now is the best time to get it with at this price point for 3,000 pieces. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. The post LEGO Ideas Tree House (21318) Amazon Sale – October 2023 appeared first on The Brick Fan. Original linkOriginal author: Allen "Tormentalous" Tran

LEGO hasn’t released much in terms of gift with purchase sets for Disney 100 but that will be changing really soon with the release of Mini Steamboat Willie (40659). The set has 424 pieces and you’ll be able to get it from October 23-31 with purchases of $100 or more in Disney properties which includes Marvel and Star Wars. The set features a mini replica of the LEGO Ideas Steamboat Willie (21317). Minifigure The set does includes a minifigure of Mickey Mouse in black and white. Unlike the previous versions of the minifigure, the legs are not dual molded but a flat gray. The hat has also been released before from the Series 2 Disney Collectible Minifigures (71024). Build Although the finished build has a black and white color scheme with some gray, there are colored parts when you’re building the set. The innards include a gear mechanism that controls the...

Best of BrickNerd - Article originally published October 20, 2022. If you have ever been to a LEGO convention, you are probably familiar with the noise of hundreds of LEGO balls rattling through a continuous chain of mechanical madness. But do you actually know where the tradition originally came from? As a GBC (great ball contraption) builder myself, I was quite curious about this question because I didn't even have the answer. So I did some research and this is what I found. Let's go back in time to see where the idea of GBC came from and how it all started. Ping Pong Ball Handoff It all started with a ping pong ball. In 2004, The Lafayette LEGO Robotics Club (LafLRC) created a challenge called the “Ping Pong Ball Handoff”. The idea was simple: receive a ping pong ball from the robot to your left and pass it to the...

Best of BrickNerd - Article originally published October 17, 2022. A common gripe among AFOLs of a certain age is that the instructions have been way oversimplified. “When I was a kid a whole castle had less than 50 steps!” (6074 Black Falcon’s Fortress had 36 and 6077 Forestmen’s River Fortress had 22—OK more of a tower but still). While building the recent Gift With Purchase (GWP) set 40567 Forest Hideout, I was pondering this complaint. Especially when assembling the cut-out doorway and remembering this step being frustrating as a kid—and it is still fiddly and frustrating! One of my binders of saved instructions! Since 40567 is a direct remake of 6054 Forestmen’s Hideout, I thought a comparison of the instructions might be interesting. I still have the instructions to 6054 as my dad cut them apart and covered many of my early instructions in clear contact paper. Thankfully for everyone else,...

LEGO has put up a product page for the new LEGO Christmas Fun VIP Add-On Pack (40609). Like with previous Add-On Packs, it’ll most likely require a $50 purchase to get it. It features a number of Christmas related elements such as snowflakes, a Santa hat, and lots of food pieces. For those who have been asking, the polybag does not come with any of the white parts to make the house in the pictures, just the decorative parts. The post LEGO Christmas Fun VIP Add-On Pack (40609) Official Images appeared first on The Brick Fan. Original linkOriginal author: Allen "Tormentalous" Tran

I like sorting. It’s a soothing exercise (very unlike rewriting an article in Squarespace after not hitting save and hitting the backspace button). It’s calming, peaceful, and uses just the right amount of finger power while leaving brain power free to meditate on life’s joys and sorrows. It’s fortunate that I like sorting because I keep finding new collections to sort. So before we get started, let me walk you through The History and Times of Sorting LEGO Bricks According to Geneva. Then vs now My first sorting article was a time capsule of the collection I grew up with. The collection was sorted piecemeal as it came along. I started with a color-based sorting method, then went part-sorting crazy (did I really need Tile, Modified 1x2 with Bar Handle taking up a whole container?). Overall, the sorting method was patchy. Are wedges slopes or plates? Who thought sorting SNOT bricks...

Last year (wow, has it really been that long?), we took a look at individual LEGO parts’ mold variations and the different techniques that were unlocked by using one specific variation or another. Well, our amazing readers had all kinds of great feedback, including a few elements that I hadn’t even considered the first time around! I’ll be highlighting some of those, plus a few more that I’ve thought of or discovered in the interim as we dive once more into… molds over time! Stacking Up Let’s start with a brief summary of the last article: many LEGO elements have been changed over time for various reasons, such as to make them more “in system” to match the design ideology of more modern pieces, or simply to enhance their functionality. Whether deliberately or by circumstance, this has created situations where different variations of the same element can be used for totally...

“If you can draw the human figure, you can draw anything!” I’ve seen this statement in all manner of art books and websites. There’s a lot of truth in it, but also a mighty challenge! We all know exactly what a person looks like. So it is very easy to be hyper-critical of small mistakes. Plus, the human form is hard with so many curves, so many things that are proportional to each other, then tie in foreshortening effects, and on and on. Many of the same issues exist in building the human form in LEGO with the addition of working in a medium that is fairly rectangular. Figure/character building is so not my wheelhouse—my much-neglected Flickr is mostly spaceships, castles, and LUG events. That being said, some of my figure builds are MOCs I’m the most proud of. So I hope sharing my journey out of my comfort zone will...