In order to compile a list of the biggest and most challenging Lego sets, it was necessary to narrow down the criteria. First, the sets have to be mass produced by LEGO. In other words, we’re not considering any giant custom sets like the 6-meter Death Star Trench or insane 150,000 piece recreation of Helm’s Deep from Lord of the Rings. Second, we excluded expandable sets such as the Modular Building series that you can keep adding on to like the Town Hall (10224), Green Grocer (10185), and the newly released Palace Cinema (10232) that can be combined together to lay out enormous Lego city scenes. Furthermore, to define what we mean by “biggest” the list considers those Lego sets with the largest amounts of pieces and/or final completed size of the set. As far as “challenging,” most of the sets listed below are suggested for builders aged 16 or older, although I’ve personally seen kids half that age cranking out 1,000+ piece sets with hardly any difficulty. Some of the sets listed below are still available at Lego stores worldwide, while some are out of production.
But you may find retired sets listed for outrageous prices on Amazon or eBay, though, those ones are arguable the best LEGO sets. Once Lego stops selling an item, or if produced in limited quantities, third parties grab those products and jack up the price depending on demand. You’ll find Lego sets a purchase limit per customer on certain items. Last week we created a list of must-have movie-themed Lego sets. Now, here’s a list of the most challenging and biggest lego sets, ordered somewhat subjectively but with consideration of total number of pieces combined with level of difficulty. By the way, the number in the parenthesis represents the Item Number in case you decide to go on a hunt for one of these Lego sets. It’d be hard to argue against Lego’s Star Wars Collector’s Millennium Falcon as being one of the most challenging and largest Lego sets (it also probably ranks as our #1 LEGOs for adults). The $499 Millennium Falcon is suggested for ages 16-years and older but younger kids can probably get through it with some supervision.
The highly detailed scale model is made up of a whopping 5,195 pieces but only 5 mini-figures including Luke, Princess Leia, Han, Chewbacca, and a stormtrooper. Why the set doesn’t include C-3PO and R2-D2 mini-figures is sort of a mystery (weren’t they on the Falcon during the mission to rescue Leia?), but nevertheless the ship itself is more than enough to focus on. The Collector’s Millennium Falcon was released in 2007 and retired in 2010, but remains the most-expensive mass-produced Lego set to date. If you need a little break from science fiction-based Star Wars sets you can jump into an architectural project building the Taj Mahal. The $299 set gives you more bang for your buck than the Collector’s Millennium Falcon, boxing a total of 5,922 pieces (about 700 more than the Falcon). What also makes this set a bit more of a challenge for builders is that all the pieces are all generally the same color. This makes it especially difficult for those who like to dump all their Lego pieces into a pile rather than build bag-by-bag.
Puzzle builders will attest to the difficulty of puzzles that don’t vary too much in color or patterns. The Lego model of the famous Taj Mahal palace in India was released in 2008. The Super Star Destroyer is a massive Lego set with 3,152 pieces and five mini-figures including Darth Vader, Admiral Piett, Dengar, Bossk and IG-88. You’ll spend most of your time building the interior structure of this ship (which in the end you don’t even see), but the results are an extraordinary detailed rendition of the massive ship from the Star Wars saga that measures almost 50-inches and weighs almost 8 pounds. The Super Star Destroyer sells for $399 US.The newest addition to the grand list of Coolest Things Ever is being unveiled in New York today: the Lego X-Wing, the largest Lego model ever built. The model of the classic Star Wars fighter being unveiled in Times Square has a wingspan of 44 feet and comes complete with R2-D2 and a full range of sound effects. It’s a super-duper-sized version of Star Wars Lego starfighter set #9493 and was made with 5,335,200 Lego bricks.
That, according to Lego, makes it the largest model ever built, eclipsing the Lego robot at the Mall of America by some 2 million bricks. This replica of the Rebel Alliance dogfighter is 42 times the size of the Lego version we’ve all built and a bit bigger than a real X-Wing. (Yes, yes, we know they’re not real. Just go with it.) The X-Wing Luke Skywalker and his fellow rebels flew was about 41 feet long, 2 feet shorter than this Lego masterpiece. The X-Wing was built at the Lego Model Shop at the company’s facility in Kladno, Czech Republic. It took 32 “master builders” (Note: This is a real job, and we’re preparing our resumés.) 17,336 man-hours to construct the X-Wing. Plans for the model were created using Lego’s proprietary 3-D design software, and the construction team had to work with a team of structural engineers to ensure that the model was safe, master builder Erik Varszegi told Wired. “This has been a wild and exciting project for us, and it’s taken an international team of designers, engineers, structural consultants, model builders, and logistics personal over a year to bring this model from a conception to reality,” Varszegi said in an email.
“In one respect, designing it was the ‘easy’ part, as we were creating a scaled version of an actual toy construction set.” Once completed, the model — which weighs 45,980 pounds — was broken down into 34 pieces to be shipped to New York by boat (the voyage took two boats two months to complete). Lest the West Coast feel left out, the starfighter is coming to Legoland California after its tenure in Times Square and will remain there until the end of the year. Twenty-three tons is a whole lot of anything, especially Lego bricks, but much of the model’s weight lies in the model’s steel skeleton, which it needed in order to withstand the vibrations from the subway that runs beneath Duffy Square in Manhattan and any seismic activity it could face in Southern California. While a slightly larger-than-lifesize Lego X-Wing would be awesome even if were made for no particular reason at all, the model was built to celebrate the forthcoming premiere of the latest Lego Star Wars series The Yoda Chronicles — a three-part animated miniseries launching on Cartoon Network next Wednesday.