Gingerbread has so much going for it—deep, sweet browns, rich, spicy aromas, and the splendid color contrasts of fluffy white frosting and colorful candies. Innately playful and consistently colorful, gingerbread houses are perfect for recreation in LEGO bricks. So this December, let’s cut some calories by enjoying our gingerbread LEGO-style! Let’s start the tour of gingerbread town with LittleJohn’s crispy Gingerbread House. This mouthwatering creation was built for an Iron Builder round. See if you can guess the seed part! If your gingerbread men need a little more space—or you want more cookies to eat—consider this Gingerbread Manor by Stilly Bricks that looks delicious! Kudos for using yellow, a non-traditional gingerbread house frosting color. Grant Davis must have pulled out his Christmas tree in August in order to photograph this creation. Once again, it’s a Gingerbread House fit for an Iron Builder, though you may have a harder time guessing the...

The winter season brings lots of joy to young and old through various forms: the warmth of a roaring fire in the fireplace, the festive holiday seasons, playing in the snow, or sipping a hot drinks purchased from a mug-shaped beverage stand! Wait, what? That’s right, a delightful mug-shaped beverage stand in Santa colors of red, white, and black that I call Cup-o-Jolly Java. I created this little festive beverage stand as a new addition to my LEGO Winter Village. I imagine the LEGO townspeople stopping by for a hot beverage to keep them warm. Although this build is a relatively recent build of mine, it was actually not my first version of the drink stand. Back in 2016, I built one in a Starbucks-like dark green and silver color scheme, but the silver pieces were very expensive as they were only available for a brief period in 2012. You can...

Swamps. Muddy, stinky, and generally not desirable places to live. But if you need to, it’s way better to be mobile. Why lock yourself into a single location when all of them are available!? Jake (Mountain Hobbit) shows us exactly what this would look like with his wonderful Swamp Walker MOC. We also get to pick his brain a bit on how he went about designing and engineering this. Inspiration Chris: What was the inspiration for this build? Jake: The idea for this build came from a piece of concept art that I found while looking for build inspiration. I didn’t have much of an idea of what I wanted to build, just that I wanted to make something swamp-themed. I came across this piece of art and knew I had to try building it. cONCEPT aRT BASED ON Bridal Procession on the Hardanger I actually followed the concept art very...

The history of LEGO Technic is simple and straightforward, right? The theme began in 1977 with four sets, and it's been a constant fixture in the catalogue ever since. Well... the fact that you're reading a BrickNerd article about it means things are not that simple. Before There Was Technic Let's start with the pre-history of what we now know as Technic. It actually starts much earlier than you might expect with set 001 "Gears", a Samsonite set released in 1965 that mainly contained, well, gears! Axles and bars didn't exist yet, so these gears were actually modified plates with studs and anti-studs. You could put them on metal axle wheels with studs introduced two years before. The gears weren't that big a success, appearing in only two more sets the year after. Samsonite set 001 from 1965. Image from Brickset. A few years later in 1970 with lessons learned from...

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...