Windmill on the Hill

As you can see we already have fine visitors from black knights house but while they do their business with the windmill keepers, please take a look at the building.

It was made in octagonal shape with big slope roof. It has 4 main floors.

The first floor serves as storage room for grain and flour - made by mill wheel which is also here.

The second floor is actually a kitchen and dining room for mill keepers. There is a little furnace to cook some tasty food and table to dine in peace. You can also see a painting of his majesty king Richard on the wall! Black knights are now in peace with royal knights so they will not mind.

The third floor is bedroom with bed, chest and a desk to keep a production log.

The forth floor is a little workshop with some tools and spare gears for the mill.

Outside there is a shed with some hay, scythe, fork and other tools. Near the shed one can chop the wood to make the furnace burn. Water is gained from the well. The mill keepers also have some goats and sheeps in the croft and also a mini garden with herbs, vegetables and flowers.

A young boy from village nearby is helping them with their tasks.

Our noble guests came on horses and by cart. I heard the mill keeper was once a black knight, but now lives peacefull life working in a mill of his own with his wife. That explains a crossbow in one of the rooms. It looks like everyone here knows each other and makes business often.

I always liked LEGO castle and was often bulding my own creations when I was a kid. Much later when I got some of the modern sets, I thought why not to make some of my own castle build using all the new parts and inspiring building techniques. I chose windmill because I wanted to connect system buildings with technic functions. Windmills are full of gears inside, so I thought that it is a good way to do it. My windmill is fully motorized using technic gears and motor. The switch is on the side of the build and looks like some rock with small leafy plant on it. The motor powers the blades and the mill wheel as you can see on the video. When one gear is taken out, it is possible to operate the blades and the wheel manually (by round brick at the back of the mill just under the roof).

This gear can be taken out thanks to the fact you can easily detach some of the bigger parts of the build (initially to make it easier to move from place to place).

The well is operated manually also with some technic parts.

Other reason behind the idea was to show some peacefull medieval life in the mountains. The setting of the build is very close to nature which was my goal to achieve.

I chose black knights as the mill guests, as they are my favourite castle faction. Why favourite? They have got really cool armours and bardings which I loved as a child. It was something completely new back those days in the 90's. As a fantasy lover I also love their shields with a dragon.

I updated their stuff of course, but some of the old style parts remained (for example the shields that I had mentioned). I borrowed the torsos from dragon knights - they fit perfectly.

I had a lot of fun making this build and I wish it would give a lot more if it was made the real set. There aren't actually that much technic parts, but the way to motorize whole thing at acceptable speed of the blades and hiding whole mechanism under the mill was really satisfying. It is even still possible to change batteries without any problem!

I tried to make the hill looking really rocky and not too repetitive.

Another tricky part was to make the road with a curve to fit the cart. I tried my best to design everything with a bit of realism, fun factor and the fact that every little addition to the build gives much life to it.

All in all to look like a great set I would have loved as a kid.

Actually not only as a kid.