LEGO Ideas members cdwboy1979 and his collaborators yasu_arakaki, truckurt1, jluisnorojas, Chubino, srsakura, oz_kz8, decided to build and submit their The Wonders Of Peru to LEGO Ideas. Based on the traditional Peruvian Ayacuchano, the team designed a LEGO version to pay tribute to Peruvian culture in all its facets.
Help us congratulate them on joining the exclusive LEGO Ideas 10K Club and for sharing their story with us!
About Yourself
- Where are you from?
We are a collective conformed by 7 members, artists and creatives, currently living in Lima, Perú.
- How old are you?
The team has an average age of approx. 30 years, the youngest of us is 27 and the oldest is 40.
- What do you study or do for a living?
We have different careers, some of us dedicate ourselves to advertising, others to 3D animation and illustration and one of us is a sculptor.
- What hobbies do you have?
Obviously, we all love to collect LEGO, so our offices are full of them. You can find all types, from Star Wars to Superman, Batman, and even you can get to find the Volkswagen Camper van.
- How and when did your interest for LEGO come about?
We practically all fell in love with LEGO when we were kids. We grew up with them! Spaceships, pirate ships and castles from the middle age. Since then it has been something that has fascinated us throughout our lives.
- What is your favourite official LEGO set? Why?
Most of us love the LEGO sets of Star Wars but in the same way we think the Creator Expert sets are amazing! Mainly those of automobiles.
But LEGO has so much variety that practically you can have a top ten for every year of life that each of us has
- What is your favourite LEGO element? Why?
3005 Brick 1x1, is practically like a pixel and this shows the versatility of the LEGO. When you gather many pixels you can create anything you imagine!
- Is there a LEGO designer (official LEGO designer or fan designer) who you are inspired by and look up to? Who and why?
When I was younger I had been enchanted by the M61A1 Cerberus by Brad Edmondson seen on MOCpages. I had also tried to reproduce it but with poor results.
- Is there one or more particular LEGO related websites (not official LEGO websites) that you visit often and/or are inspired by?
It's quite inspiring to see the works that fans are uploading around the world in places like:
- Eurobricks.com
- Mocfolio.com
- Bricklink.com
- Brickset.com
About Your Project
- Where did your interest in this particular model come from?
We live in Peru - a country of multiculturalism, of different ethnicities, customs and geographical areas, so we wanted to show this in a set of LEGO.
We found it interesting that LEGO began to show the Latino culture, starting from our model that reflects just what we are, a mixture of races, customs, etc.
- What special challenges did you face creating the model? What was the most difficult part to recreate?
The most complicated thing was to be able to group, in a single LEGO set, the different geographical areas that allowed us to show the different ethnic groups and customs.
That was when the opportunity arose to use the Ayacuchano altarpiece, a sophisticated Andean folk art in the form of portable drawers that inside show different situations or landscapes, under this concept we could group everything we wanted from Peru in a single set.
- How long did it take to complete the model?
It took approximately 2 months to do the conceptualization, layout and design.
- How did it feel when you reached the magic 10,000 votes and how long did it take?
Practically for almost 5 months we refreshed the LEGO Ideas site 100 times a day to see how many votes we had, so when we reached 10 thousand it was incredible because the wait was very long.
- Approximately how many LEGO bricks did you use to create your model?
We used 2441 pieces. In fact we thought that we would need the 3000 but in the end we did not.
About LEGO Ideas
- Do you have any useful advice about creating a successful LEGO Ideas project?
Teamwork must be very arduous. An idea grows when several heads come together to think, in this way creativity flows and problems find quick solutions. This is why this project was worked by a multidisciplinary team with different strengths. In this way each one added their creativity from different areas.
- What is your favourite LEGO Ideas project (besides your own of course)?
We love Women of NASA because it's simple but it represents something big. Without a doubt it is a set that has made history for LEGO for what it means and symbolizes.
We also thought the Yellow Submarine of The Beatles was spectacular.
- What is it about the platform that attracts you? What tips would you give to anyone who is thinking about uploading an idea?
The platform is great. We still remember when we were kids and we put together our own ideas with LEGO. Once finished the first thing we did was show it to our friends, brothers or relatives.
Today LEGO Ideas do this, but on a larger scale since your idea or creations can be shown practically to the world and best of all get sold in a store.
Our biggest advice is that you have to take the necessary time before uploading a project to the site, you have to correct and polish every detail and once you feel that it is a product that you are sure you could find in a store and buy, it is when you can start asking for votes
By
hasanjensen