Art - 100 Lego Stories

Harnessing the magnetic power of M-Tron

Posted on by 100 LEGO Stories in Art, Canada, Convention, Featured 2

LEGO® Story #27

When I was 21 and in my dark ages, the Eaton’s department store in downtown Vancouver had a deluxe LEGO® display with custom shelves and a huge selection of sets. I was instantly drawn to the space sets, and spent several visits to the store trying to decide whether to buy one or not. I had so many fun memories of building with LEGO® from my childhood but I was hesitant to buy one. In 1991 I thought I must be the only adult contemplating buying a LEGO® toy. Regardless I eventually convinced myself it was OK and purchased set number 6877, the M-Tron Vector Detector space set.

This first purchase soon led to many more, and it wasn’t long before I owned the entire M-Tron line. Then I soon added many other sets from the Town, Space, Pirates and Castle themes. This initial purchase has led to a lifetime of LEGO® collecting and creating.

Paul with his Unchain my Heart LEGO® model

The best part about buying that first set is that it opened me up to a world wide community of LEGO® enthusiasts that I wouldn’t have met otherwise. It has been a pleasure to see the community develop and evolve over the past 30 years. I have met many lifelong friends at my local LUG and at LEGO® Conventions.

In addition, I have also developed my artistic abilities and have been fortunate to have my LEGO® models shown around the world. This includes touring around the United States with Brick Universe, a LEGO® Fan Convention. In 2019 I had one of my designs, Imagine It, Build It, chosen to be a BrickLink AFOL Designer Set; and I was also invited by LEGO® to display my model, We Built This City, in the LEGO® House Masterpiece Gallery. I recently launched a website, www.paulhetheringtonartist.com, showcasing all of my creations and adventures.

All these amazing friendships and experiences were attracted to me because of that first magnetic M-Tron space set purchase. As you must have guessed the M in M-Tron stands for magnets!

Paul Hetherington – Vancouver, Canada

Website: www.paulhetheringtonartist.com

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Designing a Dream Display: A Custom LEGO® Wall

Posted on by 100 LEGO Stories in AFOL, Art, LEGO, United Kingdom

LEGO® Story #20

LEGO® has always been a part of my life. As young as 3 years old I was playing with it. My father traveled a lot when I was young and, back in those days, the only toy available at airports was LEGO®. I used to wait for him to come home, not just to see him, but to see what LEGO® he had found.

As I grew older, I moved through the various genres of the brick, from town and space through the electronic train and into Technic. I have always been an early riser and my mother said she always knew when I was awake because she could hear the LEGO® being rummaged through.

I was never someone that played with LEGO®, I was always purely a builder. Nothing was ever finished so there was no time to swoop the spaceship through the air, I could always see how it could be improved or that it needed a landing pad or support truck.

By the time I was 13 and moving into being a teenager I had amassed quite a collection and had a permanent LEGO® layout in my room. My move to boarding school started my path into adulthood and I put my LEGO® into several large storage boxes and hid them in my parents’ loft. It was not until years later with the birth of my 3 children that my LEGO® was recovered, and I started an entirely new relationship with my lost youth.

I delighted in teaching them how to build but would find myself staying up late into the night building. Buying LEGO® for them and spending time building reconnected me with lots of happy memories and feelings from my youth which helped me through 2 nasty divorces. I can remember at the end of my first marriage building a huge Eagle Transporter from Space 1999 that was minifigure scale and over a meter long.

As my children grew away from LEGO®, LEGO® became more and more a part of my life. I used building as time to think and reflect. I was never happier than building, listening to an audio book and letting my mind wonder over all the problems of my life. My LEGO® was listed in my second divorce and I nearly lost my 1^st Edition Millennium Falcon! Fortunately, I have managed to hold onto it although it was destroyed and had to be rebuilt from scratch!

Now a bachelor, and still a big kid, I have embraced my LEGO® heritage. It is a huge part of my life. I have a “mini figure me” the travels all over the world with me and has been to some amazing places from Maputo to Burma. It always gets a huge smile when I set him up to take a picture.

During the recent renovation of my home I was determined to make LEGO® a permanent part of the building, making a corner of a garden wall a feature to look like the entire wall was LEGO®. It is this that has inspired me to build a LEGO® house into the corner wall of the kitchen. The house is about to have all the windows changed so my LEGO® room is packed up but I do have some of my favourite pieces on display in the downstairs toilet!

Laurence Woolford – United Kingdom.