Adventures at Lego BrickFair

The internet is loaded with countless examples of how Lego fans use their brick skills to construct a wide variety of impressive builds. However, there’s nothing quite like seeing these builds in person.

Last weekend, I went to the Lego BrickFair, which was held at the Dulles Expo Center in Chantilly, Virginia, where dozens of Lego fans and groups displayed their creativity through an impressive array for builds that moved, lit up, or depicted detailed landscapes. Below are some of the pictures I took, along with a few descriptions of what the builds are supposed to be and who made them.

Plenty of builds were based on different pop culture icons and franchises. The pics below include nods to Ghostbusters, Godzilla, The Muppets, Scooby-Doo, and video games such as Animal Crossing and Pac-Man.    

The Pac-Man sign below could be viewed from two angles. On one angle, Pac-Man is chased by ghosts; on another angle, Pac-Man is chasing the ghosts.

The castle below is a depiction of one of Bowser’s castles from the Super Mario video games. This build featured a number of flashing lights and moving parts, and visitors were encouraged to trigger a sensor that would open the castle’s main gate.

Brick skyscrapers of all types dotted the expo hall, with many of them bordered by brick roads and moving brick rail systems.

One of the largest builds was a towering megalopolis, a gigantic arrangement of interconnected buildings. This build featured many levels, store fronts, glowing screens, and minifigures. The crowded, high-tech look of this build was very reminiscent of the aesthetic of Blade Runner; in fact, a few levels featured landing pads for flying cars that resembled the Spinners from the Blade Runner franchise.

The build below was a rotating build that depicted different characters and stories from ancient Norse mythology.

The builder KW Legoformers displayed a selection of his Lego Transformer builds, which were largely based on the Generation One toys that were released during the ‘80s. He even had a Lego version of the Devastator combiner set standing next to the actual toy as it was originally released in 1985. He also has a YouTube channel devoted to his Lego Transformers, where he changes his builds from robot to vehicle and back. 

Both DC and Marvel superheroes were well represented at the expo. One of the more unique Marvel builds was a Red Skull castle. If you look closely, you can see a Captain America figure in the mouth of the castle’s skull.

In this picture below, look closely at the card next to the black van. There were plenty of Batman-related builds at the BrickFair, but this was the only one I saw that was a callback to the Mobile Bat Lab Mego toy from the '70s. 

Some fans built upon classic Lego lines. The pictures below show how some fans expanded the classic Lego space line with larger, more detailed vehicles.   

One ambitious display was that of an aquarium, with the fish suspended in the “water” by a web of transparent lines.

Not pictured here is the booth hosted by the Hampton Roads Naval Museum, which is located in Norfolk, Virginia. While this organization is not a Lego fan group, it uses Lego for educational purposes by providing kits and instructions based on actual Naval history. You can visit their website here to learn more.