The 10 most expensive Lego sets See all Editor's Picks Photo via Antonio / Flickr Remix by Max Fleishman You won’t find these at your local elementary school. Lego enthusiasts can shell out serious dough for the privilege of building the coolest, rarest, most extravagant sets. Lego’s priciest advanced models are highly valued collector’s items. The most expensive retired Lego sets can fetch up to five figures. Among the most expensive include sets themed after Star Wars and major world landmarks like the Taj Mahal. What makes certain Lego sets so expensive? It’s not solely because of the number of pieces or a popular franchise tie-in like Star Wars. The value of a Lego set often skyrockets after it retires. “Rarity is the most important factor with any LEGO collectible. If a set is rare, and desirable, and continues to be rare, it will remain valuable,” said founder of Lego pricing guide BrickPicker Ed Maciorowski. Here are the top 10 most valuable Lego sets according to the Lego collector’s website Brickpicker:
Number of Pieces: 1248 Notable features: “Market Street” is Lego’s second entry in its modular building series for adult builders. The set features curved staircases and interchangeable floors. Number of Pieces: 2,056 Notable features: Lego’s “Cafe Corner” features three stories, a mosaic, and a bicycle. Number of Pieces: 3, 428 Notable features: The completed Lego Eiffel Tower is the tallest Lego model to date; standing at 42 inches. It features a French flag made out of Lego bricks. 7) Imperial Star Destroyer Number of Pieces: 1,359 Notable features: Lego’s model of the Imperial Star Destroyer ship from Star Wars includes eight synchronized cannons, an Emperor Palpatine hologram, and a Lego figure of Darth Vader. 6) Death Star II Number of Pieces: 3,447 Notable features: The Lego Death Star II is built to scale with the original and includes a super laser. Number of Pieces: 1 Notable features: Made to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Lego’s Minifigures series, only 5,000 Mr. Gold figures were produced in total.
4) Statue of Liberty Number of Pieces: 2,882 Notable features: Lego’s Statue of Liberty model is made entirely of sand-green bricks. Number of Pieces: 3,263 Notable features: Lego’s electricity-powered Grand Carousel spins and plays music. Number of Pieces: 5,922 Notable features: Lego’s Taj Mahal became the company’s largest set when it was released in 2008. Number of Pieces: 5, 174 Notable features: Lego’s “Ultimate Collector’s Millennium Falcon” is the largest Star Wars set and the second-largest Lego set ever made. It features Lego figures of Luke Skywalker, Hans Solo, Princess Leia, Chewbacca, and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Up next after the break:Lego bricks do not come cheap. Just ask Zhao, the Chinese artist whose Lego sculpture worth $15,000 fell victim to the clumsiness of a small child at a Lego Expo on Sunday. The sculpture, a brick version of Nick from the animated film Zootopia, fell to pieces within an hour of the exhibit's opening.
SEE ALSO: Sneakers made of only legos are perfect for playtime and game time On the bright side, $15,000 worth of Lego bricks are worth the same amount whether they're assembled or dissembled. And though that number may seem high, it's not particularly surprising considering the prices of retired Lego sets that fetch much more than their original retail prices. This is some seriously pricey plastic. Wildly Expensive Lego SetsThe 25 most valuable Lego sets of all time, from the Millennium Falcon to the Statue of Liberty Lego bricks aren't just for stepping on and screaming in horror. They're also quite the commodity. The beloved building toy has spawned a secondary market where rare sets can be worth thousands. With the help of Jeff Maciorowski from the Lego investing site Brickpicker, we present to you the 25 most valuable Lego sets in history. Ultimate Collector's Millennium Falcon: $3,987.40 Statue of Liberty: $1,998.87. Imperial Star Destroyer: $1,744.
Death Star II: $1,656.87. Rebel Blockade Runner: $1,199.20. Castle Giant Chess Set: $1,128.20. Y-wing Attack Starfighter: $1,067.60 Super Star Destroyer: $881.33. Vader's TIE Advanced: $673.20. Marina Bay Sands: $657.40. Get the Slide Deck from Henry Blodget's IGNITION Presentation on the Future of Digital Read Business Insider On The Go Available on iOS or Android See All Jobs » Thanks to our partnersLego has come a long way since its roots. The story of Lego goes all the way back to 1932. Originally, Lego was a Denmark company that did actual carpentry work. After a streak of really bad luck that involved a workshop fire and The Great Depression, owner and operator Ole Kirk Christiansen moved on to make smaller builds like shelving and ladders. To display these products without making an entire item at his own cost, he made miniaturized versions of them to give potential customers an idea of what product they were purchasing.
These miniatures inspired Christiansen to expand his business into making toys. For the most part these toys would be wooden until another warehouse fire in the 1960’s consumed most of Lego’s wooden toy inventory. Christiansen decided to take this as a sign to focus on his line of plastic building bricks. This was a gamble since the response to plastic toys was lukewarm. In those years, people still preferred wooden and metal toys and looked at plastic as a sign of poor quality. Luckily for Christiansen, the gamble worked in his favor. Since then, Lego has gone on to become one of the most popular toys of all time. At one time, Lego made simple sets with generic themes like pirates or knights. As time has gone on they’ve made several deals with many hot properties to base their sets on, from Marvel Heroes to nostalgia classics like Ghostbusters and Back to the Future. Their Star Wars sets are consistently big hits and generally have rather high price tags for what are essentially children’s building blocks.
Speaking of high price tags, let’s check out some of the most expensive sets on the market right now. Note: All prices come directly from Lego’s own catalog. In store (and in some cases collector prices) may actually be higher or lower. Did you plan a weekend at the fair but the weather decided that its plans to rain were more important than your plans for fun? For roughly the same price as a weekend at the fair you can bring a miniaturized version right into your own home. At 1,746 pieces and an Expert level of difficulty, it might even take you the whole weekend to piece it together. This isn’t the Lego set you build to keep on display to show your build skills off to your friends; this is the Lego set that you actually play with when nobody is around to judge you! It includes some iconic characters as mini-figures and the loony bin van complete with a strap-in stretcher is a really nice touch. The Star Wars ship line seems to be a really big hit for Lego.
Children and adults alike buy these things up and piece them together to display in their homes. One perk to them is their large size and attention to detail. These aren’t just miniatures you build and play with. They also tend to have interesting mechanical parts. Variants are released from time to time that make past models rather expensive on the collector’s market. Good luck finding them though. The Town Hall is the most expensive set piece in a collection of Lego sets that can be combined together to make an entire city. Other parts of the city include a pet shop, a bike shop, a police station, a post office, and so on. A really cool feature with this collection are the endless possibilities that Lego offers in terms of adding your own personal details like streets, parks, and playing with different arrangements. There’s a good chance that no two complete Lego cities will look exactly the same. This play-set probably isn’t as fun to play with as the Arkham set, but it is a cool display piece for the hardcore Lego enthusiast.
The mini-figures have their own distinct look instead of the standard Lego look, and the house has a lot of cool details. You can look in the windows and see the familiar indoor arrangement from the series, Flanders comes along with the grill that sparks Homer’s jealousy, there are loose bricks on the fire place, and it even includes the iconic purple station wagon. This Lego kit looks so much like the real thing that you can barely tell it’s Lego. To achieve this look and the high level of detail, this vehicle kit has the same amount of pieces as your average play-set. With over 1,800 pieces and a price tag of $199.99, you’re paying almost $0.10 per piece. That most definitely puts the cost of these Lego sets into perspective. The final product is totally worth it, especially in this case. The Technic line of Lego figures tend to have more complicated mechanical parts and generally run with a small motor and a battery pack. Fortunately, they aren’t too complicated to assemble for Lego’s target age group.
Of course, we all know that the kids ask for Lego sets to build, but the parents are the ones that end up assembling them to be played with (or destroyed) later. Like the Arkham set, this is the type of set that even adults want to play with when no one is looking. It’s more expensive than the Simpson’s House and the Arkham set, but it definitely gives you a lot more bang for your buck. It has a very unique look for a Lego set as the pieces are supposed to resemble a forest instead of a building, and it comes with a HUGE assortment of classic Star Wars character mini-figures. The Sea Cow set is actually a Lego original as it came from this year’s Lego Movie. The Sea Cow ship is captained by Metal Beard, a Lego figure who had his parts taken by the nefarious Lord Business. The character is voiced by famous “man’s man” Nick Offerman. Pirates are so synonymous with lost limbs that it’s mildly surprising the shtick wasn’t used in a Lego set before the movie.
Star Wars sets seem to be the cream of the crop for Lego. This model would probably be especially hard to assemble when you consider the fact that 90% of the thing appears to be brown. Put this Sand Crawler together and tell those folks that put together 2,500 piece photo mosaic puzzles that you’ll teach them everything you know! If you don’t have the funds to visit the Sydney Opera House in Australia, this pricey Lego set is actually much cheaper than airfare and boarding. It looks so much like the real thing you may think you’re in Australia and not even realize it’s 4:00 AM and you’ve stayed up all night on your living room floor putting the thing together. The Mindstorm Ev3 is something to behold. Sure it only adds up to a measly 600 pieces, but it takes on several forms, has its own infrared sensors, it has a programmable brick that you can use to make your build move and speak, and the build can be commanded with your tablet or smart phone. This is the Lego kit of the future.