Late last year while looking for something to watch for movie night, out little family discovered “Beyond the Brick: A Lego Brickumentary” on Netflix. This was timely as we were looking forward to the upcoming “Art of the Brick” exhibit that was coming to Seattle. The documentary is great and if you have a kid who has the attention span for a documentary, it’s worth watching. We popped some popcorn, cuddled up and half way through the movie I heard about BrickCon.

BrickCon!!! I cannot believe that it has existed for 15 years and takes place in Seattle and this was the first time I had ever heard of it. Let’s start with — what IS BrickCon? Check it out here: http://brickcon.org

And if you don’t have the time to read more at the link, here it is high-level: BrickCon is a four day conference with a focus is on building friendships and community through the sharing of time, ideas, building techniques and unique creations. BrickCon is a four-day convention for adult fans, collectors, and builders of LEGO®. In other words – HEAVEN!

 

We recruited our geek in crime, Janie and headed to BrickCon on a Saturday afternoon after a rainy soccer game. Walking in, we weren’t sure where to start. BrickCon is thematic; whatever “MOCs” (My Own Creation) are submitted for judging are grouped into categories (castles, scenes, battles, spaceships, etc.) and tabled together. I wanted to run straight to Castles but Janie wisely started us at the beginning, which moved us along the traffic flow. One of the first things we came to was a full German Christmas Market, which has always been a dream of mine to create. There must have been hundreds of thousands of tiny white Lego flowers for snowflakes.

So much cool stuff. We noticed a table to the side that had a Game of Thrones theme. The Wall!!! With a giant inside the Dungeon! Pyke Castle!! Euron Greyjoy tossing Balon over a bridge! Little was fascinated even though he had no idea what he was looking at.

Some of the other amazing things we checked out included a giant Steampunk island with rollercoasters and carousals, gears moving and clocks ticking. That one was done by a mother and son team – talk about squad goals! And Janie, who is headed to France for her honeymoon in a couple months, loved a full replica of Le Mont Saint-Michel.

Our plan for next year is simple. We were right – these ARE our people and this was totally our place. We are going to volunteer next year and learn more about the builder culture and how we can join in. In the meantime, check out the website to watch for the 2017 dates. In our opinion, this event was much cooler than Art of the Brick and we are lucky to have it in our backyard.