What is the best LEGO® to give your child?
Geoffrey NewlandLEGO® sets are all equally good, no? Well I've learnt over the years that isn't quite the case (for me).
When I first bought sets for our children my wife and I didn’t overthink it. We tried to avoid too much pink (LEGO friends) but in general we thought, it was all vaguely educational/ ’good’ for my children, and I had many fond memories of hours spent building Castles and space ports, so assumed they'd be doing the same.
Our buying was mainly the sets and themes my children were keen on. And whilst there's no harm in this I do now look back on some of the Disney and Harry Potter set purchases with a slight regret. Although much loved when they were bought, the ‘reuse’ count of the parts in subsequent self builds has been, in general, much lower than for LEGO® own brand sets. In comparison some of the LEGO creator and even Friends sets provided us with bricks and wall panels that have gone on to feature in many self builds.
One thing is undeniable though, once my children got past just wanting to build the purchased sets and keep them, i.e. when both girls were in full ‘self build’ mode they would run out of the right sort of parts they needed pretty quickly. Most frustratingly these parts might be already used in an existing ‘don’t touch’ self build that was on our display shelf.
Additionally, what made the issue more acute is that my children wouldn't employ the same level of building variety that the master set designers at the LEGO company dream up. Hence the self builds of my children of say a simple house might employ far more simple bricks (see pic), than those of the professionals, meaning we’d run out of the right bricks fairly quickly.
Constraints can be the engine of creativity, however, this isn’t always appreciated by a five year old who is already at their limits in simply using bricks but still wants to continue. If its too hard at some point they move on.
My solution to this brick shortage was to go online, in my case to Bricklink and BrickOwl and buy, at a few pence per piece, preloved (but checked) LEGO pieces.
Sticking these all together in a hollow ball made a great Christmas present. More importantly it filled out our collection in the areas we needed it most – namely 1 by 4, and 1 by 6 bricks, mainly White. Since then I’ve used BrickOwl several times and although slightly difficult to master – (hint use the their ‘catalog’ feature), the rewards are there. I later discovered that the LEGO company have their own store, in their Pick a Brick section. Using these one off pieces from here we built models like our ‘far away tree’ and a Ninjago themed Octagonal castle type structure.
One advice I’d give if you are buying individual pieces (new or preloved) is to buy a single piece type in bulk, and to make it a fairly multipurpose part. If you are unsure, the simple 1 x4 brick (piece number 3010) in White is a great start. As of today there are 165k of them for sale on Bricklink!
Image: Piece 3010 (1x4 Brick), along with 3009 (1x6 Brick), 59349 (1x6x5 Panel) and 52438 (8x16 Plate)
Once my children knew they could get enough of a part, both the scale and scope of the builds increased. They would rarely check before starting out that they could get the part count needed to complete a build, but buying 200 White Bricks gives you some certainty! For the Ninjago themed large dojo we built we bought both numerous green roof tiles and red fire hydrants (all in probably £10). Both of these type of piece were used in their official set build (Ninjago Dojo temple) so our pieces really helped our self build look authentic and enabled us to merge it with the LEGO set itself. Note: Someone will have to explain Ninjago to me – I loved the movie but am still not too sure if its MadMax, Bruce Lee, or Japanese ‘monks’)
If Grandparents or others ask ‘What LEGO sets should I buy’ then theyre unlikely to want to spend time on these sites handpicking the optimal bricks. In those instance sets from the creator series are, I think, full of good bits (like this one) and on a £/Brick basis some of the best value. Even better are the boxes of parts in the basic primary colour (like this one).
In summary, I’d say to encourage building you cannot go wrong by buying en masse a single colour, single thickness ‘wall brick’ (as my kids call it). Fundamentally buildings play a huge part in many self build MOCs and a white, beige, or Grey building block can serve many different needs, from Californian Beach house, to emergency COVID hospital for the next crisis!
