Beasts from Bricks review

This selection of  fifteen LEGO animals provides copious instructions to show fans how to build Beasts from Bricks

Author: Ekow Nimako Publisher: Quarry Books RRP: £16.99 Available: August 31

Ekow Nimako is a Canadian artist who exhibited a gallery of animals built using LEGO bricks. Now, Quarry Books follows up last year’s Birds from Bricks with a volume of Nimako’s work, Beasts From Bricks.

It is a worthy follow up to Birds from Bricks, using the same format that was successful for that edition. The beasts are split by continent, with fifteen builds representing animals from around the world. Each animal gets a small fact file before detailed instructions demonstrate how to build it. The step by step pages are nice and clear, as much so as official LEGO set instructions are.

Beasts from Bricks is a particularly appealing title in the LEGO library as the LEGO Group so rarely focus in the organic side of life, favouring vehicles and locations over living things. For anyone wishing to build more of the natural world, this provides a great starting point.

Building animals can be difficult, as the natural shapes are trickier to recreate with LEGO pieces than the angular lines of buildings. It is also the detail that is a challenge though, unless the scale is on the large side, it is hard to represent the little quirks that might distinguish a particular creature. Here, the book offers a great demonstration of using choice elements to keep the scale small. The Koala is a great example of a fairly small build that is instantly recognisable.

A few of Nimako’s techniques and part uses are inspiring, in particular the ears on the White-Tailed Jackrabbit. The way that the European Bison is built to be lying down also demonstrates a useful way of representing animals in different poses.

This book is about the instructions rather than presenting beautiful images of the models. The execution is spot on, with clear pages and a variety of interesting beasts to build. This should be added to the bookshelf for LEGO fans looking to get inspired by the natural world.

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