For the Love of Brick: Interviews with LEGO Enthusiasts

Welcome to For the Love of Brick’s first episode for 2021! To launch Season 2, we are releasing a special episode in celebration of this week’s Brickvention, Australia’s LEGO fan convention hosted in Melbourne. Greg hears from a collection of AFOLs who share their fondest experiences of Brickvention. Common themes of community, creativity and sharing their love of LEGO with their peers and the wider community are throughout this little episode...

Greg is introduced to the wonderful world of GBC (great ball contraptions) after chatting with an Aussie GBC expert, Rohan Beckett. Greg learns how GBCs blend fun, engineering and problem-solving together, including some of the ingenious ways GBCs transport balls from point A to B. Rohan shares the joys but also the unique challenges of engaging in this niche LEGO area...

Greg chats with British AFOL Chris Smith from FC Brickstand, a brick football club from the Buildersliga. Chris explains his transition from recreating football stadiums with LEGO to the creation of a fully-fledged brick football club, complete with fierce competition with other teams, an enthusiastic fan base and a star striker...

Greg gets to wear his cultural hat this episode as he chats with US Brick Artist, Kate Hunter, known for her striking mosaics, ranging from recreations of 1960s Pop Art to her own original creations.  Kate shares how creating mosaics was initially a way for her family to cope with COVID lockdown, and how her mosaic sets spread beyond her home, bringing joy and comfort to other members of the local community...

Greg meets with Andrew Tuppen and Damian Hinds, known by many as last year’s runner-ups of LEGO Masters Australia, but their love of LEGO extends much further than the limits of the show. They reflect over their time on LEGO Masters but also discuss how the show has allowed them to launch their own LEGO business, Clicking Bricks – where they continue to spread their love of LEGO with others whilst often supporting valuable community organisations and schools in the process...

In celebration of the 10 year anniversary of LEGO Ninjago, Greg meets with Brayden Nelson and Lachlan 'Jan' Jansen - both who teamed up with two other Day 1 Ninjago friends to create an upcoming documentary called Ninjago 10 years of Spinjitzu: A Documentary. Greg gets a rundown on Ninjago including how to actually pronounce the word! They also share the process of tackling this remarkable project...

Greg chats with Marcel Bonnici, an automation engineer behind the hugely popular YouTube channel ‘Astonishing Studios’, where he showcases his astonishing LEGO creations inspired by vending machines – machines that dispense food to even more advanced machines that actually cook the food! Greg learns more about the evolution of both Marcel’s machines and his YouTube channel, and the challenges of balancing practical mechanics with good-looking designs...

This episode features Tom Alphin, the multitalented AFOL who runs the Brick Architect website. Tom has authored The LEGO Architect book and Greg learns more about the process of creating a successfully published LEGO book. They chat about Tom’s resources for the LEGO community, such as the LEGO Storage Guide that helps people identify the most ideal way to organize their LEGO collection...

Greg chats with the accomplished emiko oye, a US jeweller who creates bold and colourful jewellery using repurposed LEGO. She shares with Greg her LEGO journey - going from having dreams of becoming a fashion designer to having her work exhibited at numerous shows and museums. Greg learns more about the unique qualities of LEGO that make emiko’s jewellery so engaging and how jewellery is considered a serious art form...

Greg catches up with Jay Ong, a fellow Aussie AFOL behind Jay’s Brick Blog – an independent LEGO blog that started when social media was just in its infancy and influencers weren’t a thing. Jay shares with us why he finds creating media content about LEGO so fulfilling and what he hopes his followers get from following his blog...