accio brick - the lego harry potter comm

In light of recent developments, I figured you could use a bit of positivity, so... Lego has announced a Harry Potter In-store Build for the Harry Potter theme during the Back to Hogwarts week. At participating Lego Stores (for clarification, that's actual brick and mortar Lego Stores and not just a store selling lego or even the online shop), while supplies last, you can build a Butterbeer sales cart, and frankly it's pretty cute. ( Read more... )

Again, check your local store's page to see if they're participating or making changes.

Worth considering:
The Back to Hogwarts Event begins tomorrow 01 September.
(US link above or Canadian link)

- Purchases at or above $40 get this year's Harry Potter lego Polybag: 30706 Quidditch Lesson as a GWP. (While supplies last.)



- Purchases at or above $130 additionally get 40770 Hogwarts™ Castle: Room of Requirement GWP. (While supplies last.)



- Lego Insiders (what the VIP program is now called) can order 76457 Hogsmeade™ Village – Collectors' Edition early as of 01 September (everyone else needs to wait until 04 September).
- While supplies last, those doing so will also receive the metal Hogsmeade™ Sign GWP.



So be aware, waiting to make your Harry Potter purchases until the Butterbeer truck build event may cost you the GWPs if they run out of them by then. As the Make and Take event doesn't seem tied to purchases, it might be safer to order what you want on the first and attend the in-store event the following weekend if it works for you.

Photos! Good ones even! 😆

We have photos of the 2025 GWP (gift with purchase), and it's genuinely better than I was expecting! Lego Harry Potter 40770 Hogwarts Castle: Room of Requirement.

Let's not oversell it. Overall it's a mixed bag, to be sure, as it's in the format of the foldable classrooms which have issues based on their constraints / parameters. There's little way around that with the current 2024+ Hogwarts castle scheme, and folded, it's a bit of a mess. That acknowledged, this little GWP nicely captures the scene where Neville greets the trio in the RoR in Deathly Hallows (DH2), and DH (or HBP) sets are always welcome, and I haven't got a lot of room left to display things anyway. Plus it makes sense in combination with the Hogsmeade D2C set with the Hog's Head (it was that or an RoR with Dumbledore's Army (DA) practice). As a side note, it's largely something people can get in the ballpark of, building it on their own, if they miss this set. It's always nice when lego do that to reduce the FOMO. There are a few stickered pieces (the portrait, for one) that make it hard to directly replace, the adult Mimbulus Mimbletonia (the recolour of the potions bubbles presently only available in the 2025 76445 Hogwarts Castle: Herbology Class set, and then there are the hammocks... Still. An acceptable MOC is within reach.

Also, this year is now officially the year of Neville, just saying. At this point, we may be seeing more of him than Harry. To be clear, I don't actually mind that, but I do feel Hermione and the girls haven't been as fairly represented this year. If they were going to push Neville, they needed to tone down the Ron. And where's Ginny been hiding? ( Read more... )

There's not a lot going on in the world of JKR's Harry Potter lego right now, so I've been exploring lego representations of a few other authors' works, particularly where I feel they might slot in nicely with the lego Wizarding World. Today the Lego Jane Austen GWP special went live, in honour of the 250th anniversary of her birthday. Sticking with the theme, in the coming days I'll be taking a look at two Jane Austen MOCs from TJBricks - Barton Cottage from 'Sense and Sensibility' and Pemberley from 'Pride and Prejudice' - which have been submitted to lego Ideas, a platform where fans can vote for sets they like and if they reach 10K votes, lego considers them for production. Personally I think that's an excellent way to get people to engage and a great way to showcase fan creativity. It's free to register, and you can vote for as many designs as you like, and there's never any obligation to purchase if it does get released, so support away to your heart's content! And even if lego decides not to release the set? There's still a chance fans will - with official lego pieces and everything - via Bricklink. All very cool, even if not always affordable. 😆

One unfortunate drawback to the Ideas projects is they aren't forced to discuss piece counts or keep potential pricing realistic. Another is that lego generally doesn't rework the sets in a significant way, and as a result some of the design choices are more simplistic or, at the other end of the spectrum, senselessly extravagant than they would be were they projects exclusively from lego's eminently capable hands. Some adjustment of expectations is required due to those aspects. Lego is also perfectly aware of the pricing problems, and support of a project increases the chances that some form of it might see the light of day, so don't let minor quibbles keep you from voting for it, especially as lego remains MOCable. Change at will, my lovelies!

Today I'll be reviewing Barton Cottage...( Read more... )

As a whole, great job, or I frankly wouldn't bother to niggle. This really gives you a starting point to work with, material to sink your teeth into. Further I'd like to mention the effort they've gone to on social media, reddit, youtube, Jane Austen forums, Ideas subreddits, Classical Lit, Period Dramas, National Trust, etc. interacting with, y'know, people (I know, right?) to promote their work, which is a non-trivial part of launching an Ideas campaign, and something in all honesty I can't see myself ever having the energy to do. (No way, no how. 😐) There's even a little commercial (video) that I'm non-trivially jealous of 😆 that they've made for the Pemberley project, which was ... is there a chef's kiss emoji? There should be. 👩‍🍳💋 Anyway, phenomenal work all around, and I wish them a boatload of success with it, not the least because I want this set, naturally... 😉

So if you have a moment and are so inclined, you can help support them here by voting for their project on the lego Ideas site.

It was unavoidable. When Trump began faffing about fairly indiscriminately with tariffs and trade wars loomed, lego prices stateside quite naturally had to be impacted as well. The increase is expected to be roughly 15 % on the smaller sets decreasing to 7 % on the larger ones. The global effects are still unclear, but usually when there's a price hike somewhere, companies often to take advantage of the cover it provides and raise prices elsewhere as well, or they use it to defray the spike in one area, or the production is scattered and more intertwined than we tend to think and more regions are affected. Perhaps having gone through price hikes in Europe in recent years, however, we might be spared. ( Read more... )

And now we have some news as to the price thresholds for the 2024 lego Harry Potter theme gifts with purchase (GWP)! "Gifts with purchase 9/1-9/10"( Read more... )

And we now have some great pix of the 2024 lego Harry Potter theme gift with purchase (GWP)! Amusingly enough, it also solves the question of "Just what should Floo powder look like?" that erexen and I were discussing only yesterday. How's that for timing, huh? (It looks like we were right about transparent fluorescent acid green... 😆)( Read more... )

I'm definitely looking forward to this set. 😃

Starting 01 September, fittingly enough, the 2023 Back to Hogwarts Celebration begins. Check your region's lego site for the precise time. US, UK, DE. <- that might matter if you're trying to snag the GWP particularly with a popular purchase (Day One Gringotts, say... 😉)

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And we have some news from a very reliable leaker on this year's lego Harry Potter theme gift with purchase (GWP). Open the fold for more... ( Read more... )

They may be taking things too literally there, but you have to love truth in advertising. In what may be a first, the Leicester Square LEGO Store is offering a Gift WithOUT Purchase. To celebrate Dobby's birthday (June 28th), they're offering a free 76421 Dobby the House Elf in exchange for socks!( Read more... )

Not Harry Potter lego news, for a change, but there's a new Gift With Purchase (GWP) available as of tomorrow (which generally means midnight. No clue how quickly this set will disappear from the shelves, but if you were thinking of making any large lego purchases, particularly the Jazz Club modular (which, so cute!), now would be a good time to snag them.

The lego Icons, 40586 the Moving Truck with 301 pieces GWP is officially available from 21st February through 03rd March 2023 with purchases upwards of 180 EUR in Germany (the amount can vary depending on your country). Those dates can vary, too. Generally speaking, when it's sold out, it's gone and won't reappear, so if you want it, place your orders sooner as opposed to later.

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