Mxter Builder

Some of my Lego architecture builds over the years. By no means a comprehensive view of everything I've done...sometimes *some people* (like me. mostly me.) forget to take pictures. These are all made primarily from bricks I've collected, set by set, since I was 8 years old. Sometimes the local Pick-a-Brick wall would favor me enough to have one, maybe even two pieces I needed, but that was very rarely an option.

[sids-a-brick-house]

This Is (Almost) Fine / Playing with Fire (2024)

I made this for a challenge I was given (by myself. No one else asked for this.) Someone in the LEGO chat at work posted that they had built a set referencing the "This Is Fine" comic, but it was made by some company other than LEGO. I took it upon myself to make it out of LEGO, without using the image of their set for reference, just that of the original comic. Let's talk about what went into this (almost) fine art.

First things first--here's the original comic:

Credit: KC Green My first step was gathering as many yellow and orange pieces as I owned, since the background fire is actually doing a lot of the heavy lifting in these images. My second step was to go to the Pick-a-Brick wall at both (yes, both) LEGO stores in Manhattan to see if I could find other pieces that could help with the fire and, importantly, the dog. As you can perhaps tell from the final result, I did not find all the pieces I needed for the dog... The second title for this work is "Playing with Fire" since I spent a lot of time iterating on finding the most organic, yet cartoonish, style of fire that I could make from the LEGO bricks at hand. It is easiest to see in the first picture that each of the 3 fires was constructed differently. They were actually my top 3 out of 6 or 7 candidates, with my favorite probably being the one on the left. With both the fire and the clouds, I wanted to leverage the 3D medium I was using while still being true to the original image. As a result, I added depth while keeping the color palette minimal.

In the end, the melting dog could really just represent the implied third panel of the comic.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Senior House Courtyard (LEGO Contracting Gig™) (2021)

In early May 2021, some of us were only starting to get our first COVID vaccinations, so Steer Roast, the annual tradition from the MIT dorm Senior House since 1963, was virtual for the second year in a row. I took advantage of this to host a virtual event that I billed as "Your friendly neighborhood LEGO contractor--you think it, I build it!" It turned out to be a popular event, inspiring my ever-upcoming plans to do this again on Twitch. The people who came were inspired by the nostalgia of Steer Roasts past, and component by component people described parts of the Senior House Courtyard they wanted me to build. As I built, I would explain my design decisions and ideas, and respond to feedback as I built. So let's dive into this resulting eclectic scene!

First let's talk about this centerpiece--the eponymous steer being roasted. I originally made it a hunk of read meat (ie, a red brick construction featuring red bricks with round holes connected by red 2x4 plates on an axle). I was informed that we actually roast steer legs, and due to a comical miscommunication, I just added red legs to the hunk of meat, having understood that legs are involved somewhere in the process. The spit was over a fire pit comprised of loose red, orange, and yellow 1x1 plates, some smooth, some studded, some angled, to give the impression of embers below. And of course there had to be a few flames shooting up.

The feedback I give myself by building something gives me ideas for general improvements. The constraint as a LEGO contractor is, of course, finding the right bricks in a timely manner. I was able to switch things out and use red bricks with axle holes so that making a rotating spit actually...rotated what was on the spit (wild).

When that was built to everyone's satisfaction, the next suggestion was the courtyard's legendary tire swing. This hopefully answers your question from watching the previous video and wondering what that blue guy is doing. (Disclaimer: blue guy is actually from a Power Rangers Mega Blocks set. Apologies to the LEGO company. My bricks are all from sets I was gifted, and I never get to use a Power Ranger in any context other than here, at virtual Roast, since at in-person Roast several people wear costumes and whatnot. I haven't seen a Power Ranger at Roast though--we usually go for original, unlicensed ideas.) Anyway, just like in real life, the tire swing was attached to a very tall tree with branches very high up.

I am so glad I was organized enough to find the one brick I have with the "rope" (well, string, at this scale) with the hook. I don't really remember which set it came from. Might've been an Avatar: The Last Airbender set. Regardless, I used that and a small rubber wheel to complete the task. (The wheel's size was the best it was going to get in terms of scale and wheels I owned, since the others were too big, but in real life the person would fit into the hole of the wheel.)

give bricks to the tree

The LEGO version of the Senior House courtyard tree

The name of the video comes from an...encouragement of sorts throughout the dorm's history. "Give blood to the tree". And wrapping around the tree is indeed how the swinging was done, so, one could see that happening easily. Finally, there was the tree on the left--the courtyard's magnolia tree. I admit, as you can tell from all the previous builds on my blog, I hadn't spent any time making trees before this. Regardless, like with everything else I'd built so far, I talked to the attendees about my build decisions while I was making them, and ended up actually quite satisfied with the results, given the constraints. I knew I had several brown arches and hinges and whatnot, so the real question was just how to compose them organically.

Part of the organic nature of the scene is having a loose flower on the ground, as one would in real life. The flowers were comprised of red translucent round 1x1 plates and white opaque 1x1s, either round or square (depending on how much the flower had bloomed). The leaf details were limited by what I had available, but I think that at least also adds an organic touch to the tree, so i distributed the green 1x1 plates semi-randomly. An important note here is that I had no reference image, so the details of the flowers came from one of the attendees (or, I suppose, one of my clients) describing it verbally as she watched me build. Overall, for the constraints (time, primarily, to think quickly in response to suggestions and work within the limitations of the bricks I already own), I think it turned out pretty well, and all of my clients gave positive reviews. Maybe I'll make some business cards for this gig.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Lighthouse (2021)

It had been a long time since I made a serious build. I’d started a few other things in the meanwhile, the biggest endeavor of which being Bojack Horseman’s house (2018), but I didn’t get far enough for me to consider it worthy of even the “unfinished” tag. But a conversation with a coworker about how great Legos are, which included me stating something along the lines of “Legos are my gender”, inspired me to pick up the abandoned lighthouse project I’d started years back. Very little of that original design and the original sections I made actually made it into this final build. I updated and expanded the design several times over the month it took me to build this (partly because I kept telling people I was building something, which caused me to raise my expectations for myself). What was originally designed to be a skinny tower with yellow clear bricks in the top of the tower representing a light became a full blown tower with a working light and sloped sides on a cliff overlooking water with waves and a sailboat. So let’s take a closer look!

This was my first time really building a full scene surrounding the main architectural piece, and the reason behind the scene was actually pretty practical. Once I realized that I had my (now vintage) incandescent lightbulb brick and trusty old RCX (and once I learned to clean out the remnants of exploded batteries), that really changed the game. However, an RCX is pretty bulky (12 studs x 8 studs x 4 bricks high) so it wouldn’t fit in the base level of the lighthouse. Therefore, I decided to make a cliff to hide it away underneath the building.

(Sorry for the obnoxious portrait orientation, I didn’t originally plan on having to put this video through YouTube in order to upload it here.)

Fortunately, I didn’t have to program my RCX, which is very difficult since the device was put on the market literally 20 years ago and is only really compatible with 32-bit Windows by default. I already had a program on it (that it somehow didn’t forget while unpowered, which is a common issue) that was made to power a motor in one direction for a few seconds, then the other, and repeat. The great thing about incandescent lights (rather than LEDs) is that if you run the current in one direction, then the other, it’s lit both ways. So all I have to do to turn on the light is go to the RCX and press the “ON/OFF” button, then “Run”, and to turn it off it’s as simple as what I did in the video--going to the RCX and pressing the “ON/OFF” button. Simple, but adding some electronics does add a bit of magic to the build.

However, the electronics added complexity to my always modular design process. I now needed each section to have the wires align such that they all connected easily when the modules were stacked, yet the layers could also be separated easily.

(Again, sorry for the portrait orientation.)

You might notice that I have to pause when unstacking the second section and I turned the camera away, mostly because I was focused on gently loosening the second section from the third using one hand (so as not to break my rule requiring builds to be separable with one hand and without directly pulling anything apart). I accidentally squished the layers too tightly together at some point, I suppose. The layers do not need to be that tightly packed for the electricity to conduct, though, which is pretty neat.

Also, the only features on the interior of this build are ways for minifigs to get up to the lookout deck. There is a ladder in the top section of the lighthouse, and to get there, there is a spiral staircase that winds upwards from the bottom section to the top of the middle section.

The windows for the actual light section of the lighthouse have a secret door from which minifigs can exit to access the lookout deck.

I made this minifigure a telescope. Seemed fitting for the scene.

The simplicity of the interior made it more compelling to add details elsewhere, such as the landscape. Instead of making a plain grey block for a cliff, I wanted to add rocks and patches of moss and grass that thinned out as a minifig reached the top of the cliff.

I also wanted to have a more rugged rock face in general. 

I liked the look of having rock overhanging the water, too. Playing with shadows and reflections really made things interesting. The image shows light being reflected onto the cliff sides from the water, which was something I didn’t factor into my original plans, so it was a beautiful bonus.

Now we can talk about the components that really round out this scene. 

Building waves was really cool since it made me think about details like the frothy edges of the white part of the wave.

The most surprisingly complex addition was the sailboat. I decided I didn’t want boring, unrealistic, completely flat sails for my boat. I wanted the whole scene to appear dynamic and realistic. That’s also why there’s some “water” on the side of the boat that’s splashing over into it. 

Even though I could have stopped there, I spent some time looking up sailboat diagrams to make the sail parts move in a somewhat realistic way. The sail is actually light enough to move by blowing it, although the boat as a whole is not light enough to be pushed that way, at least not on any surface I have available.

There used to be a rudder on the boat that, in theory, could be controlled by a minifig (they could definitely hold it, but seeing as they don’t move, they can’t actually control much.) However, to fit the boat in the water, the rudder had to be removed and now it’s just implied that it’s submerged. (I know there’s also another component that goes on the underside of the boat, but I knew that one wouldn’t be visible when I included the boat, so I didn’t add it.)

[sids-a-brick-house]

Mismatched Neighborhood: House 2 (2016)

This is one of two houses I built simultaneously as part of an experiment in making residences and attention to detail. Unfortunately, there are fewer pictures of this house than of the other one, which means that we’ll never see the special attic of this building. More on that later. (Keep reading for more pics!)

I wanted to make a more brightly colored house than a drab grey for a nice contrast with the other house, but I don’t have as many beige or white bricks (or even both combined) to make a whole house, hence the tricolor (or really, 2 shades, one color) walls. My mother also really loves turrets, and I figured it would look good with the sloped roof, even if it was pretty small, given the pieces I had. It’s interesting because the multi-color scheme almost camouflages the windows so they’re not immediately obvious to find. 

The back of the house has larger windows that really dominate the walls, as well as a clear back door.

Let’s look inside!

The first floor has a beige diagonal staircase to the second floor (top left), a sectional facing a large flat screen tv (bottom left), a kitchen table next to a fireplace in the turret (bottom right), and a kitchen (top right). Because this house doesn’t have a garage, unlike the other house, I had a lot of space to work with, but because I chose diagonal stairs, it was harder to figure out how to make good use of the space. But we can just call it “not cramped” and “open concept”.

Here’s a closer look at the family room and stairs. To get to and from the couch, a minifig must walk under the stairs. A little awkward, but still accessible.

Here are the kitchen seats and fireplace. It looks pretty cozy. I didn’t exactly make the turret look like a chimney, though, so this design is probably hazardous in real life.

Here’s the kitchen! There’s the hood, the stove with one burner on (but nothing on the stove, that should probably get turned off!) and the oven door open. Next to it one of the black kitchen cabinet doors is open as an example of its functionality, while above pans are hanging from the wall. Finally, there is a sink on the right.

On to the second floor, which is a bit more complicated.

Going clockwise from the top left, there is the landing for the stairs, then the half bath, then the small bedroom with a shelf that has a bar for hangers underneath and a twin bed with yellow sheets and pillows, then a library with a green lamp and brown shelves with a matching brown chair next to the turret, which has a fireplace on this floor too, and then a small master suite with a shower and a king bed with dark green sheets and dark green and grey pillows.

Here’s another picture of the library where the chair isn’t knocked over so that the lamp design is slightly more visible.

The roof had a drop-down ladder that came down into the library area and led up to the secret laboratory I always dreamt about (I mean, I always imagined it would be in a basement rather than an attic, like in Dexter’s Lab for example, but here the contents were still awesome and the light was better, so I now would reconsider my own real life plans.) Speaking of light, actually, in addition to the 3 windows the roof had on both the front and back, the sides of the roof actually used clear bricks, allowing in more light. Since the attic had very little space that was tall enough for a minifig to stand, I added a seat on a rail so that once a minifig came up from the library they could get on the seat and slide down the length of the attic to access different parts. The attic had a long row of levers and parts like these to play around with:

I’m not sure what would actually be made in the secret lab, but I’m sure it would be cool.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Mismatched Neighborhood: House 1 (2016)

This is one of two houses I built simultaneously as part of an experiment in making residences and attention to detail. In addition, each house has an unusual feature because, well, why not? On this house, it’s pretty obvious--there’s an entire garden on the roof. More on that later. (Keep reading for more pics!)

This is the comparatively more conservative looking of the two houses. If it weren’t for the garden, it would seem almost drab. But let’s look at the garage first.

As shown, the garage door opens like a real one. Plus, I took the bonus step of making a smartcar style car for the garage. It had to be so tiny that it really could only fit one minifigure, even though I put the steering wheel on the left.

Now for a look at the interior.

Here is an overhead view of the first floor.

The stairs here are designed to each be of a shorter height than the basic one brick tall to make the appearance minifigs climbing them look reasonable. It was also interesting to design a banister for it, as that’s a detail that often is overlooked.

Here is a closer look at the kitchen. It’s an eat in kitchen as long as you don’t mind being in everyone else’s way. There is an oven, stovetop with the front right burner on and a pot on top, and a hood. To the right, there is a sink with a dish rack next to it. There are also cabinets with functioning white doors that are largely facing away from the camera. In addition, the very corner of a living room area is visible on the right. There is a white sectional and the coffee mug is resting on a coffee table. On the left, the white door goes to some hypothetical backyard.

As for the second floor:

There are 2 bedrooms and technically 1.25 bathrooms because there’s a half bath and a 3/4 bath. Is that legal for a real house? I don’t know. Here are some closer looks at each of these sections.

The bathroom has a sink, and that grey circle is a toilet seat.

The bedroom has a chest of drawers with the bottom one open and a twin bed with beige sheets and dark brown pillows.

The master suite has a king-sized bed with grey pillows, blue and silver striped sheets, and a light blue footboard. The part with the white grilles on the left is actually the top shelf of three on the wall. The chair is under where the ladder to the roof (which is attached to the roof and can drop down) is positioned. Here’s a closer look at the bathroom.

This bathroom has a blue toilet seat that can open and close, and on the left there is a small shower. The sink is in the bottom right corner.

Finally, let’s have a look at the roof.

Here is the ladder that can lie flat against the ceiling or drop down to the area where the aforementioned blue chair is. The enclosed area on top of the ladder has windows to make a good skylight for the master suite even when the ladder is up.

This gets the minifig up to the rooftop door and garden. I put a fair bit of time into arranging the plants to make it look organic and lush.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Building 7 (2014)

The day before I returned to MIT from the holiday break, I was, you might say, dome-sick--so I decided to make Building 7 for myself. The virtue of being somewhere temporarily, though, is that sometimes you don’t get to finish what you started, and that’s ok. (Keep reading for more pics!)

This version of the building omits multiple features, like the side doors and additional columns. It’s pretty scaled down. I also did not have enough of the tan bricks to do the whole thing in one color, unfortunately. But I do like some of the details I started adding.

On the right windows, I was experimenting with using fence pieces to emulate the metal grid in front of the windows on the real building, image below for reference.

Photo credit: MIT

What’s not very visible in this picture is the inscription atop the columns. Fine with me though, since the only brick I have that would satisfy that look easily is this one:

That’s from a very old Harry Potter set. I actually have two of them, which would look even sillier.

Meanwhile, I also worked on getting a similar, scaled down version of the interior.

I was aiming to get a grid pattern reminiscent of that of the actual lobby, as shown below.

Photo credit: The Tech

Honestly, I would love to refactor, rebuild, and complete this building someday. I didn’t even get to work on the building’s dome. 

Photo credit: MIT

Fun fact: building a sphere (or with spheres) is a challenge they provide people who are in the running to become Master Builders. If I got that dome right, I’d be well on my way!

[sids-a-brick-house]

MacGregor (2014)

I was at my parents’ place on the holiday break and I missed my dorm, so I decided to build it myself. The virtue of being somewhere temporarily, though, is that sometimes you don’t get to finish what you started, and that’s ok. (Keep reading for more pics!)

Looking at an image of the dorm, it becomes obvious that I did not have the right colors to make a facsimile. 

Photo credit: MIT

I also was building the high rise, and what I had at this point...did not rise very high.

I abandoned this build in favor of Building 7.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Diner (2013)

There was some random Lego building event at the Barnes and Noble near me, so I went with my best friend at the time to sit around and play with bricks while surrounded by books. It was heaven. (Keep reading for more pics!)

They gave us all white bricks and no specific instructions, so here we are. This is the only building I’ve made (at least, in my photographic records) that cannot actually fit a minifigure through the front--an entrance for a minifigure needs to be at least 3 studs wide to accommodate their arms.

Here’s the interior:

The center has small round tables and the back is lined with booths. Unfortunately for the patrons, I don’t think I made a kitchen.

I did take a creeper shot of the interior. I sometimes like to take pictures through the windows of my buildings.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Cathedral (2011)

I really had a potato-quality a camera in these days. Anyway, this was, to date, my highest complexity, highest difficulty build. In the future I would love to do it again with a few improvements, including unifying the color scheme (which simply required more specific bricks than I had at the time). I built this the summer after taking an art history course, so I went for as much architectural accuracy as possible. You can refer to this diagram if you’re not sure what I’m referring to when I refer to a section by its architectural name. (Note that not all cathedrals are alike, and often contain fewer or more of the features in the diagram/than in my build. This diagram is the one that most closely matches what I made.) I’ve always loved Gothic cathedrals, so this build was very rewarding. On to the description (and more pics)!

(1) The facade (image above). This underwent 2 previous revisions, with the goal being to get the towers on each side in the right shape and at the right height relative to the rest of the cathedral. I settled on this design with four sloped bricks at the top of each tower arranged in a cross (when looking from above) because it gave more depth to the facade than there actually was (that may sound deeper than was intended...) I also included a rose window at the front. Which brings me to:

(2) Scale & Minifig Compatibility. On the scale at which I was working (which was relatively large, enough to be minifig-accessible) it still wasn’t large enough to include the stonework between the parts of the stained glass that would hold everything together in a real cathedral. All four of the doors at the bottom could be opened (as is true for all of my builds) and were just tall enough for a minifig to fit through. The front could be easily removed in one piece to access the interior.

(3) Minifig View. Just for fun, the above is an image of what the cathedral looks like through the front doors for a minifigure.

(4) Top. The traditional shape of a Gothic cathedral is a cross. Actually getting the bricks of the sloped roof to line up like that was somewhat of a challenge, but as you can see, doable. The roof could be easily removed in one piece to access the interior.

(5) Back. The back has a huge “stained glass” wall (much easier to make from Lego bricks than from actual glass, I assume). In addition, all the rounded parts you see are small chapels--the ones in the very back are apsidal chapels, while the ones on the sides are transept chapels.

(6) Side. Each exterior end of the transept had a rose window, as well as more doors.

(7) Flying Buttresses. This is a close up of one of the sides. The large stained glass windows lining the upper nave and transept are visible, but the more interesting component is the flying buttresses. These were fun to think about, design-wise. Of course, plastic bricks don’t require the extra support a huge stone building does, but getting the look right was pretty important. One might point out that I didn’t do the flying buttresses on the back side of the cathedral at all. I don’t recall why that is (there’s a solid chance I was low on the bricks to actually do it), but I admit leaving them out there is not architecturally accurate (and actually in real life the buttresses back there can be quite big--like in this example from the Notre Dame Cathedral.)

(8) Front without facade. Now we’re going to start taking a look at the interior. When you remove the facade of the building, you can see right down the nave and side aisles all the way to the chancel and rear stained glass. There are brown pews and a red carpet down the center aisle. Also, this gives you the best shot of the arches that span the length of the building and support the roof (which is also removed in this image).

(9) Nave. Here is a closer view of the nave. The light through the stained glass windows really plays very nicely here.

(10) Chancel & Surroundings. The altar is at the (approximate) center of this image, with steps leading up to it. There is an ambulatory around the raised area, and those white hollow areas are the aforementioned apsidal chapels.

(11) Finally, here is the full interior without the roof. Why did I take this picture at this angle? I do not know.

[sids-a-brick-house]

Cullen House (2009)

I made this and called it the Cullen house--as in, Edward Cullen & co. from Twilight. It was a different time. (Keep reading for more pics!)

I don’t recall how accurate it is to the book, and unfortunately there are no pictures of the inside (although as you can somewhat see from the next image, it was fairly detailed.)

That clear back wall to the house could be removed easily in one piece to allow access to the inside as if it were a dollhouse. This was the start of my experimentation with what I refer to as closed dollhouse builds. These are the kind where you can play with a minifigure inside any part of the house depending on which modules of the building are removed, and removing a module does not involve breaking bricks from each other.