'Tis the Season... of Spooky!

Aaron Newman September 30, 2020

I designed these famous Halloween characters in collaboration with Build Better Bricks (B3). Every year, B3’s head designer Tyler and I decide on two new monsters to build for the holiday; he does one, and I do one. During our inaugural Halloween season, I built the savage Werewolf on the left. For this year, I built a wicked Red Devil. Both figurines are highly articulated and detailed, and are designed as amalgamations of my favorite versions of these iconic monsters.

Read on to learn more about the design choices that went into each of these models, and to find out how I found my way to their striking photo presentation!

Myths of Ancient Greece

Aaron Newman August 6, 2020

After my successful series of minifigure collections from historical antiquity—check out my takes on Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, and Ancient Persia—my thirst for building in the realm of ancient Greece was far from slaked! I’ve been an aficionado of Greek Mythology since I was a kid, and have actually had the dream of designing Greek myths in LEGO for a long time (evidenced, in part, by my old Minotaur and Chimera builds). In fact, I have been peripherally collecting elements that could be useful for this exact project for many years.

The time finally came to put some of these bricks to use. I’ve designed a total of fifteen characters, split up into two sets of seven and one solo. I hope you enjoy looking at them as much as I enjoyed building them!

Read on to see the set.

"Wraiths with Wings!"

Aaron Newman May 13, 2020

I designed this replica of a Fell Beast from Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings film trilogy (2001-2003) in collaboration with Build Better Bricks (B3). Despite their limited screen time during the Lord of the Rings (LOTR) films, the Ringwraiths’ dragon steeds known as Fell Beasts are some of the most striking creatures from Jackson’s take on the Tolkien universe. I was excited to revisit this subject; the last time I made a Fell Beast was actually back in 2012, when my building skills were nowhere near as practiced as they are now.

Read on to learn more about the design choices that culminated in my finished Fell Beast model—and stick around to the end of this post to see my 2012 version, too!

Behind-The-Build: Storybook Challenge

Aaron Newman March 20, 2020

In Episode 7 of LEGO Masters, “Storybook” (3/18/2020), all the teams were presented with an identical, Mad Lib-style story, the blanks of which had been filled in creatively by a group of kids. For the challenge, each team had to present their own recreation of this zany tale involving a “book chicken,” a “horse that can do gymnastics,” a “Taker-Waker,” and more.

For our model, Christian and I chose to build the interior of the Taker-Waker’s house, which the storybook specified as being messy and full of stolen toys. This setting choice, however, turned out to be a bad one. Our decision to build an enclosed structure literally boxed us in, and guided us towards manifesting a more realistic interpretation of the “Land of Koo Koo Magic” than other teams. Unfortunately, this stylistic direction left the Brickmasters cold. On top of this, since we took the story at face value, we intentionally built a cluttered house… but ended up with an unintentionally messy-looking build.

Ultimately, our entry for the storybook challenge landed us in the bottom two teams for the first time. Although Christian and I weren’t eliminated, this was still my least favorite build of the season. Read on for my special dissection of this model’s process, design choices, and more.

Behind-The-Build: Attack on Sustainable City

Aaron Newman March 6, 2020

For Episode 5 of LEGO Masters, “Mega City Block” (3/4/2020), Christian and I created “Attack on Sustainable City,” an environmentally-minded city block under threat by an enormous pollution monster.

This build—which was divided into a 14 hour first part and a 4-hour second part—was a huge emotional roller coaster for me. As we wheeled our build into the gallery during the final two minutes of part one, our table hit a brick on the floor, sending a shock wave up the tall tower and toppling five of its fourteen stories. This catastrophic collapse felt like the lowest of lows… until we got an extremely lucky twist!

In part two of the challenge, during which we were instructed to put our city blocks “under attack,” Christian and I managed to both rebuild our fallen tower and create an iconic monster of which we were quite proud. Our finished model definitely made its mark; it turned out to be the tallest building of all.

“Attack on Sustainable City” landed us in the top two teams for this week. Read on for my special dissection of this model’s process, design choices, and more.

Behind-The-Build: Heartbreak of the Dragon Prince

Aaron Newman February 27, 2020

For Episode 3 of LEGO Masters, “Movie Genres” (2/26/2020), Christian and I created “Heartbreak of the Dragon Prince,” a fantasy romance with a thrilling conclusion!

In our final build, the Dragon Prince and his princess are threatened by a pair of nefarious necromancer brothers, who have summoned an army of skeletons to attack the castle. In the blockbuster moment we captured, the Dragon Prince—chained by wicked magic—has managed to delay the horde of skeletons with fire, but cannot prevent one of the necromancers from pushing his love from the top of the tower. Will he be able to save her from a deadly drop?

Read on for my special dissection of this 13-hour model’s process, design choices, and more.

Behind-The-Build: Beneath the Surface

Aaron Newman February 21, 2020

In the winter of 2020, my friend Christian Cowgill and I appeared in the first American season of LEGO Masters, a reality-style building competition show. For Episode 3 of the series, “Cut in Half” (2/19/2020), Christian and I created “Beneath the Surface,” a epic underwater vignette built on the side of a halved antique diving helmet.

Read on for my special dissection of this 12-hour model’s process, design choices, and more!

Not Your Average Flower!

Aaron Newman May 29, 2019

I built this original creature as an entry into a contest on LEGO Ideas. The premise: “show us your take on a nature build with an alternative twist.” Building an animal comprised of plants was one of the first ideas that occurred to me. For my animal, I decided to build a predator—emulate a lion, or maybe a tiger—to go as much against the grain of the typical, peaceful connotations surrounding plants as I could.

Read on to learn more about the design process of this one-of-a-kind monster!