Hampton Roads LEGO User Group

Next Meetings: Sunday, 13 October 1pm-3ish

and Sunday, 10 November 1pm-3ish

Norfolk Botanical Garden, Baker Hall Visitor Center, Holly Room

Usually we  we meet on the 2nd Sunday of the month, but occasionally we need to reschedule to avoid conflicts with Norfolk Botanical Garden events.

(be sure to tell the friendly person at the gate why you're there when you enter the Garden)

Recent Events:

This summer, our members supported BrickFest Live in Hampton , the Model Train Show at Chesapeake Central Library, a STEAM event at the Hampton Public Library, and the NBG Butterfly Festival, Honeybee Festival, and Mushroom Festival

A couple members also hit the road for BrickUniverse in Raleigh and BrickRodeo in Texas.

Our City/Town collaborative build, Hardlug Hollow, made its final appearance at the big annual convention, BrickFair in Chantilly, Virginia, August 3rd and 4th.  Also, lots of other cool builds from the club.  See our photos on FaceBook.

BrickFair Fredericksburg was a resounding success, especially our introduction of Hardlug Hollow in all its bright, shining glory.  Thanks to everyone who contributed in this enormous city, airport, and railroad display, and with the utility work which went into making sure it had a functional power grid!

Here are some other things we've built recently:

Where to Find us:

(details and participation subject to change)

Did you hear?  The new LEGO STORE is now open at VIRGINIA BEACH TOWN CENTER!

Also, our local used brick store, Brickin Bad, has recently expanded.

And a LEGO FACTORY is under construction near Richmond, VA!  Their Visitor Center (in the big yellow bricks) is now open at 1400 Meadowville Rd, Chester, VA

Want To Be A Better Builder?  

There are a lot of great ways to up your brick-building game.  The best one is to just start building.  The key to doing anything well is being willing do it poorly, over and over, until you get better.  Your first new creations you make might not look like some of the impressive builds you've seen online, but keep on building and you'll learn and get better each time. 

• Assembling official LEGO sets from instructions, especially the ones with higher age ranges on the box, is one great way to introduce yourself to building techniques and some of the new parts available.   

• Tips&Bricks is a prolific creator of infographics to share techniques from some of the latest creations by amazing builders throughout the AFOL community.

• Former LEGO set designer Tiago Catarino shares instructions and video tutorials for his creations (as well as doing set reviews and such on his YouTube channel).

• Jason Allemann makes LEGO move, in all sorts of ways.  And he has a website, JK Brickworks, full of instructions and videos.  He's also turned a couple of his ideas into official sets through LEGO Ideas.

• At Towering Brick Creations, Deepak Shenoy (Deep Shen) has several great articles on building techniques (and the math behind them, if you're into that sort of thing) that he uses in large architectural builds.  Also, he does some great mosaics.  Check out his Instagram feed, or read the feature on him at The Brothers Brick.

• Just want to know more about all things LEGO?  Read a LEGO fan media site like bricknerd.com, with hundreds of articles spanning a huge range of subjects.

• Tom Alperin wrote a book about LEGO and architecture, but he is probably known equally well in the community for freely sharing ideas (and labels) for LEGO organization.

• Come to a HaRdLUG meeting!  We love to share ideas.  If we aren't an expert in what you want to learn, we might know someone who is!

 "Do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are HaRd." - John F. Kennedy