The Unofficial LEGO Builder's Guide

‘Tis the season I think…. to be writing articles about LEGO and its products. My Google alerts usually pick up on stories about the LEGO Star Wars video games, or a LEGO robotics competition, or some city comptroller in Boise, Idaho who’s name just happens to be LEGO.

But lately it seems there’ve been a bunch of articles actually about the LEGO company and its products. Here’s one that appears on the Businessweek.com website.

There’s also a mini slide show that shows the actual manufacturing process of LEGO elements.

Enjoy!
Allan

As ‘fans’ of LEGO toys, I’m sure some of you can understand the love this fellow must have for the movie A Christmas Story. I mean, imagine not just collecting some memoriabilia from a film, but rather buying the actual house and restoring it.

Wow… now that’s a fan.

AB

I’ve paraphrased Jørgen Vig Knudstorp (LEGO’s CEO) to come up with the title for this posting. I think it’s an interesting approach to look at the way in which LEGO toys fit into the electronic era of computers and video games.

You can read more about Mr. Knudstorp and his thoughts about LEGO bricks and the company in this article that ties in with his upcoming visit to Singapore.

Allan B.

Maybe you’re wondering about buying this book but you’re not entirely sure what sort of things you can learn by reading it. That’s fair. It’s often hard to judge how useful or interesting a book is until you actually have it in your hands.

If you’re wondering about ULBG, then you might want to start off by taking a look at one specific page on my website that shows you a lot of detail about what’s Inside the Book.

Or, if you want a much more visual example, you might want to take a look at the Miniland scale Napoleon character built by Didier Enjary. He used some of the ideas presented in Chapter 4 of ULBG and created a wonderful model that you can see by clicking here.

I hope you’ll take a look at his work and if you do, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it as much as I did. I love the instructions he created. I am pretty sure I’ll soon be building one using the steps he’s provided.

Allan B.

This is an interesting article:

Taking Their Blocks and Playing Toymaker Elsewhere

This was obviously not an easy decision for the LEGO company. It has dramatically affected the lives of many people in Billund, Denmark. While it may (hopefully) represent a turning point for the company on its road back to profitability it’s still sad to think of the huge change that has happened for those folks.

On the lighter side the article mentions and quotes Jamie Berard, a LEGO employee I had the good fortune to meet at Brickfest this past summer. If you want some good LEGO readin’ (and other topics too!) be sure to check out Jamie’s blog: The SideShowJournal.

AB

We all knew this already didn’t we?

http://www.copcap.com/composite-9784.htm

But it’s probably worth repeating anyway.

AB

This is another one of those, “this has been a long time coming” posts. And for that I apologize.

Many of you have written and been very patient in asking for the instructions to build the Sphinx model that is mentioned in Chapter 7 of The Unofficial LEGO Builder’s Guide.

Before I present this document, I just want to back track a bit. If you’re not a regular reader of this blog you may not be familiar with the computer problems I had over the summer. Long story short…. when lightning strikes your apartment building directly there is a distinct possibility that your laptop can get fried. It happened to me. Unfortunately, since that time I’ve not been able to get the software (needed to generate instructions) working on my new PC. I’m still working on resolving this problem but it’s been frustrating.

So the document that I’m posting now, related to the Sphinx, is not the complete instructions. Rather it is a combination of newly written tips and tricks, along with some images that were originally generated for ULBG but never used in the final version of the book.

Hopefully this document will help you get started on your own Sphinx model and of course, like every original model, be sure to make it unique by adding your own special touches.

You can right click here - and do a SAVE AS - to download the .pdf tips document. You can also go to my Instructions page to find more instructions that are mentioned in the book.

Enjoy!
Allan B.

Back in 2003 I helped organize a small LEGO display in Toronto, Ontario at a yearly show called ‘The Hobby Show’. Yes, that’s really the name.

In the 25 years of the show (covering RC cars, model railroads, model rockets, die cast cars, quilting, and all sorts of other hobbies) there had never been a display of LEGO models.

As it turned out, our display came together pretty well that first year and in fact we won a ‘Best Club Booth’ award.

This year we were back for our forth appearance at the show. Wow, how time flies. When I say ‘we’ is where it actually gets interesting. This display is put on by a group that didn’t otherwise exist. Or at least it didn’t until recently. Until just this past show the group only came together once per year to do The Hobby Show display. Now, however, Janey ‘Red Brick’ has taken some initial steps to help organize us into a proper ‘LUG’ or LEGO Users Group. We may soon be meeting more often than just once per year and that’s always a great way to see old and new faces alike.

If you’re curious about our most recent appearance at The Hobby Show then check out this page for a write-up from Janey about the show or check out the page for some pics I took at the show.

Now… what to build for next year’s show?

Allan B.