Lego Mania Saturday...

 

Christmas Village Returns

Some years I do a tree, some years I don't.  This is a no tree year.  However, not to be left without some seasonal cheer--my Winter Village/North Pole display is now too large to fit on the fireplace mantle!  

Winter Village - North Pole - Arctica - Earth - OOOOO

The 11:05 from Trondheim arrived on time and is collecting passengers on their way to Fundy Bay. 

Near that station the annual Holiday markets entice residents and visitors alike to sample treats and by a tree to decorate.

The All Volunteer Christmas Jinglers fill the streets with Holiday favorites like Santa's favorite "Grandma Just Got Run Over By A Reindeer"--word on the street is Mrs. Claus is NOT amused.

The trolley collects riders while some children get ready to play a little ice hockey.

On the far end of town, the homes are festooned with lights and wreaths, ribbons and bells.  Visitors without accommodations will always find a place at the table and cot before the hearth in Winter Village.

Midway more shops greet gift seekers and the official North Pole Post Office struggles to keep up with the late coming volume of mail.  Why, look!  A hot air balloon from far away Zimbabwe has just arrived.

North Pole Proper with the Claus' home all the toy workshops and the Elves Residence is never more frenetic than in the month of December.

Mrs. Claus distributes freshly baked cookies to keep up the Elves strength!

While Santa himself is busy assuring quality control.

Lego: Oriental Vases with Cherry Blossoms and Chrysanthemums

 

Lego City Natural History Museum: Second Floor Grand Gallery

With the under frame in place, it's time to create the lattice upon with the second floor grand gallery will sit.  To do this, I use flat plates because they can create cross-tension that distribute the stresses.  The facing is white that will be seen, while I used light gray bricks for the hidden sections.

From the underside, you can see how the flat plates allow me to fit the nuances of the frame's levels which enhance the structural integrity without the need to use any peg bricks.

You can see it even better in this close up.

Snug as a bug in a rug!

Fits perfectly against the lower stairway plate.

Quite trip to the flat plate bin to obtain the initial flooring

A view of the stairs and rising baby Brachiosaurus exhibit look good!

Bird's Eye View--Love the proportions!  

More to come...

 

Lego City Natural History Museum: The Grand Staircase and Upper Stairway Foyer

 

Bird's Eye View

Grand Staircase Facade

The second floor platform with a blue tile format.  The white/black checker pattern signals transitional spaces throughout the museum.

This area of the floor is a modular piece on its own--free from exterior walls.

Lego City Natural History Museum: Setting in the First Floor Walls, etc.

 Next phase involved finishing floor tiles, building up walls, setting the dinosaur displays, beginning the lower support pillars for the holding up the second floor sections.  Some consideration was given to the right front gallery featuring creatures from the Pre-Cambrian Era Oceans.  

The main exhibit in the grand hall is the baby Brachiosaurus skeleton from the original set.

The Utahsaurus mother and brood are on the left with a baby Triceratops.

The Ankylosaurus nest is on the right

The Pre-Cambrien Ocean Gallery

The focus model is a large Ammonite.  I found one online and modeled mine after it without the benefit of plans.  It's a good model and this one is pretty close.

It's tentacles are the first thing to greet guests as they enter.  It rests on a wall of ancient ocean models with corals and other creatures.

The opposite corner has a giant model of a troglodyte. Beneath the window is a fossil of an ammonite to compare to the larger model.

Finally a trio of ancient mega-Jellyfish rise to the delight of visitors.

Saber-Tooth Tiger Gallery

The Pre-Cambrien Ocean Gallery predates the Dinosaurs in the same way that the Sabertooth Tiger Gallery postdates them.  Bookends to the Dinosaurs.

The Sabertooth Tiger is displayed in an autumn, mountainous diorama with a bone!

She fits on the outside wall of the left gallery.

In considering how to complete the gallery, the choices were limited by size.  The only other prehistoric mammal is a Woolly Mammoth, and it's too large to fit.  A Sabertooth skull came with the original set and would make a nice compliment to the diorama, however, it's not very big and wouldn't be the second focus.  That's when I looked back at my Mini-figure collection and knew the way the to go: Humans.  Cavefolk and their means to protect themselves from the Sabertooth.

The Cave couple with weapons of bone, fire, and a domesticated wolf.

They sit opposite the Sabertooth Tiger with foliage that seems to link them.

The Sabertooth Skull is on a platform near the entrance.

Lego City Natural History Museum: Displays

 As mentioned the theme in the main hall is Dinosaur Babies.  Here are two of the displays I've made thus far to fill the space.

The first is a Utahraptor mother with two of her young in search of a nest to steal eggs from.

The second is a hatchling Ankyosaur from a nest of eggs.

In the Main Hall there will be six additional Exhibits:

• A baby Triceratops
• A baby Tyrannosaurus Rex
• An insect trapped in amber
• A coprolite sample (dinosaur poop!)
• A Micropachycephalosaurus
• A skeleton of an infant Brachiosaurus

Lego City Natural History Museum: The Great Work Has Begun!

 You know that I am a Lego Maniac.  Infected by an older cousin in 1968.  I have the bona fides and the bricks to prove it!  Half of my basement is consumed by my Lego City, images from which I have shared here before.  

While I love everything Lego, I must admit that their modular buildings are a special favorite.  They inspire the latent architect in me.  They jive with my special gifted-ness.  And, they are just so dog gone fun to create.  I have all of the sets (in some instances multiple copies) since the very first Hotel and French Cafe.  That one came out over 10 years ago now, and by comparison to the latest ones, it's crude.  No interior details, a relatively simple, straightforward design with a few exterior flares.

When they come out I sometimes build them as is and add them to my Lego City, but more often than not I tweak them to fit and make sense in my existing layout.  For example, I double the size of the fire house and opened up the interiors to create a Fire Fighters Museum in the wake of my already existing and satisfying Modern Fire Station.  When they set out the bank, I completely intermingled it with my existing creation to the point that if both had their atoms scramble in a transporter accident on the USS Voyager, it wouldn't be any easier to separate their parts, while you can see the presence and influence of both.

Enter the latest modular building: The Museum of Natural History.  I have long imagine a museum of major scale in my Lego City, but I was inhibited by how daunting a proper construction would be.  The Lego offering is lovely, but lacking.  It has sparks of ideas that are amazing on a scale unworthy of the concept.  Granted, to do this one right would completely put it beyond any remotely reasonable price point.  It is a limitation that belongs to Lego, but not to me.

Living in the DMV, I have lots of museums to consider when conceptualizing mine.  The National Museum of Natural History, the Museum of American History, the National Gallery of Art, the Museum of the American Indian, the Smithsonian Museum of Air and Space.  Add to that regional museums like the Carnegie Museums in Pittsburgh, the Natural History Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, and overseas, the British Museum in London, in particular.  

Looking at Lego model's classic design, and thinking about modern adaptations I've seen in other museums, I began to formulate some possibilities.  One in particular was the use of glass domes to open up the interiors to the exterior world.  Anticipating this, I also purchased a couple of Lego Friends sets with large clear dome pieces (the Botanical Garden and the Igloo Adventure).  The Botanical Garden set proved very helpful in creating my exterior front courtyard.

 The Lego set has a foot print of 1536 pegs (six - 16 x 16 squares). I gave myself a footprint of 4096 pegs, or sixteen 16 x 16 squares.  The possibilities that a footprint over two-and-a-half times larger presents is amazing.  The Lego set is effectively two-stories tall.  I envision a structure three stories tall.  In doing so, I am also expanding the possibilities for exhibitions.  In my version the ground floor is Pre-history.  The main space is for dinosaurs with a current exhibition feature Dinosaur Babies.  The right wing will feature Precambrian creatures from the prehistoric oceans, while the left wing will feature early mammals with a focus on the Saber-toothed Tiger.  

The second floor will have both geology and ancient cultures.  I'm thinking a mix of Rome, Meso American, Japanese and Scandinavia.  The third floor with be about the universe, our solar system, human exploration and the evolution of human understanding.  All of this is subject to change with time.  So it's a squishy blueprint for now.

The base is divided into two separable sections, and each of the floors above that will be divided into three for a total of 8 modular constructions with at least three more on the roof.  All of this is resting in my head.  Here are some images from the initial work on the ground floor.  I will probably be working on this for the next several months.

I used two dark grey large base-plates in the front and two large tan ones in the back.  The idea of an inviting entrance was important to me, hence the courtyard design.

The purchase of the Lego Friends Botanical Garden set gave me ready access to bricks sufficient to create the serenity pond and fountain and unique flora like the tree.

Here, I have detached the back half to show the design of the main halls dual staircase.  Inspired by Moorish medieval examples.

The main floor tile design was limited in scope by the bricks I had, and so I framed it in white.

Then I set out to complete the space with a design that was symmetrical.

Behind the grand stairs above is a public restroom complete with sink, two toilets in private stalls and storage space for toilet paper!  Below is the back entrance/emergency exit with the office of the chief field paleontologist.  The office has a desk with a microscope, work table with fossils and storage for samples.

A bird's eye view of the work to date.  The blue tiles in the lower right wing are my first exploration of possibilities for the Precambrian Ocean displays.  I'm imagining something complimentary in shades of Green for the upper left wing.