Brick Loot Reviews, Canadian Subscription Box Reviews, Subscription Box Reviews, Subscription Boxes for Kids, UK Subscription Box Reviews | This post may contain referral/affiliate links. Read the full disclosure. Brick Loot is a subscription box for LEGO and Brick lovers! This box was sent to us at no cost for review purposes. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.) The Cost: $27 a month + $6 shipping to the U.S., with options to save money on longer subscription lengths ($13 a month shipping to Canada and $15 to all other countries) COUPON: Use code MSA10 to save 10% off of any length subscription. The Products: Custom brick kits, Minifigures, LEGO and brick accessories from various manufacturers and Brick Loot exclusives Ships to: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, France, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Australia Good to Know: All bricks from Brick Loot are either LEGOS or are LEGO compatible.
Check out all of and the Kid’s! Keep Track of Your Subscriptions: Add this box to your subscription list or wishlist! Brick Loot comes with an information card detailing the box contents and theme. This month’s theme is Galaxy Wars: The Command Strikes Back. They also included a Galaxy Wars: The Command Strikes Back sticker. Designed by Joe Meno, the J-Wing was the largest of the builds this month (though still quite small and quick to put together). My son likes things related to space, especially spaceships so this month’s theme was exciting for him. Sky Defender – Value $5.00? The Sky Defender is a Brick Loot exclusive LEGO build. It’s just like a mini Star Wars spaceship! My 6-year-old son had fun putting this together. Force Destroyer – Value $5.00? The Force Destroyer is a Brick Loot exclusive LEGO build and also looks like a mini Star Wars replica. This was another hit and an easy build. Micro Walker – Value $4.00? This Micro Walker was a very quick and tiny build.
It was designed by Simon Liu. Writer of the Galaxy Minifigure – Value $4.00? United Bricks which specializes in printed LEGO items made this exclusive 100% LEGO Writer of the Galaxy Minifigure for this month’s Brick Loot. It was a perfect minifigure to accompany the spaceships and he came with a movie script. We always love getting new minifigures so this was a hit! M-Figz Case – Value $3.29 This case is a fabulous way to display up to three of your favorite or extra special minifigures. LED Light Kit – Value $1.99 Underneath the blue brick is tiny lights. When plugged into a USB the brick glows a bright blue. Verdict: Brick Loot is a fun subscription for any LEGO fan. I had to estimate on the prices since these items are exclusive to Brick Loot. I came up with an estimated value of a little over $31, which is just over the cost of the box. We were very pleased with our Galaxy Wars themed Brick Loot box and are looking forward to what they send next month.
What do you think of Brick Loot? All views in this review are the opinion of the author. My Subscription Addiction will never accept payment in exchange for a review, but will accept a box at no cost to provide honest opinions on the box. This post may contain affiliate/referral links. Read the complete My Subscription Addiction disclosure.In November I offered a first look at the new 2016 LEGO Architecture models when photos of the sets were released online, and now I am pleased to share a review of the smallest of the four new sets featuring a cityscape scene of Venice, Italy. “Cityscapes” is a new sub-theme for the LEGO Architecture product line which focuses not on specific buildings, but on very small scale models of a cities most iconic landmarks. Liberties are taken with geography and scale to compress a whole city into a 32 stud wide scene which includes only the 4 to 5 most iconic landmarks. The Venice model is the smallest of the series, with only 212 bricks and featuring just 4 buildings.
It includes a high quality box and booklet like all the models in the Architecture series. It is tri-lingual: English, French and Italian. Each of the landmarks featured in the model are explained in the booklet along with a photo of the real building. From left to right: Rialto Bridge is a large bridge with shops near the center of the city. It is actually several canals north of St. Marks Square. This strong element in the overall composition is cleverly constructed using two 62361 / “Mudguard 1 1/2 x 6 x 1 with Arch”. This achieves a near perfect curvature and a nice elegance as compared to a basic arch. St Mark’s Basilica is the ornate church on the east side of St Mark’s Square. It’s essence is well captured in this small but colorful model, even though the real building has more arches and the columns are rather crudely rendered using 2412 / “Grille”. St Mark’s Campanile is the bell tower for the basilica, and is on the west side of the Basilica.
The ordering of the buildings is a bit strange, as you will see in an illustration below, but it looks nice placed next to the basilica even though it is actually in front of it. The lion is the only printed brick in the set besides the name tile. The two columns represent the St. Theodore & Lion of Venice columns. They are my least favorite elements in the composition, because they are too small to be enjoyed, and a clip is a pretty crude placeholder for a lion. Lastly, the Bridge of Sighs is captured in isolation on the right. It feels like an afterthought, and I would have preferred to remove it, make the model less wide, and offer the model at a lower price. While I did recognize it immediately when seeing the model for the first time, the real bridge connects two taller buildings rather than being a standalone structure, causing this version to not make a lot of sense. Despite some shortcomings, I give this model an 8/10 rating for aesthetics because it captures the feel of Venice really well.
The part selection is pretty good with a variety of colors, some clever parts usage including the ones I already called out above. The most valuable part is the 90398 / “minifigure statuette” in White which is a new color for that element. Only one is needed to build the model, but two were included in the set. At the time of this article it is a 5$ part on Bricklink, but I think it will fall to around 1.50$ in a few months. Due to reasonably diverse parts, this set is a 6/10 rating for part selection. The MSRP is 29.99$, which is a staggering 14 cents per brick. (It doesn’t include lots of large bricks to justify price, and the new Berlin model includes nearly 300 bricks for the same price.) Sadly, this is a 4/10 rating for value, one of the worst priced sets in the whole LEGO Architecture series. It’s a cool model, but an overpriced set. I have to put this near the middle of the pack of the Architecture series with an overall rating of 6/10. I would recommend this set for people who love Venice, folks to really love the Skyline series, or if you can find a great deal.
It feels like it should have been a 19.99$ or 24.99$ set. Spoilers / Box Build I always try to build the LEGO architecture models without using the instructions. This was a pretty easy model to build using on the photo on the front of the box. I’ve included some photos of the finished model, so don’t scroll any further unless you want to see spoilers. In November, I built this model using spare parts from my collection. I had shared some photos on my Instagram account, didn’t share them on my blog until now. I identified how to build most of the model correctly, with the only mistakes being the need to substitute some parts for different colors or similar parts because I have a relatively small collection. I also used slightly different but equivalent parts on the base, mostly due to the fact that I did not own and had never seen part 87609 / “2×6 Plate with 4 studs on side”. Once the official set arrived, I built it without using the instructions. (This is called “Box build” when done competitively at LEGO conventions.)