– by Deborah Rogers –
Star Wars has landed in Sidney! Once again Lego models will be the feature exhibit of Sidney Museum from January through March as it celebrates the 10th anniversary of this popular show. During this time more than 100,000 visitors have enjoyed over 300 creative models from Star Wars to pirates, castles to the Eiffel Tower.
This year there are over 30 exciting new models including the Star Wars Sand Crawler, Benny’s Space Ship from the Lego Movie, The Tower of Orthanc from The Lord of the Rings, and The Tumbler from the Batman movie. The theme this year is ships and there are many to see including a harbour scene built by Victoria Lego Users Group (VicLUG).
Ten years ago, when challenged with what to display at the museum during the quiet months of January through March, Museum Director Peter Garnham offered to display his family’s collection of models. For the first few years he and his two sons would build and then dismantle the kits each year, but now there are so many that they have to be stored between shows.
Not all the models are for young children, and some carry the advice 16 years and up. One such model is the Taj Mahal with nearly 6,000 pieces that took 35 hours to build, and the Star Wars Millenium Falcon with over 5,000 pieces, and a collectible value of $2,500.
Lego started in 1932 in the Danish village of Billund where Ole Kirk Christiansen created wooden models. Two years later he called his business Lego, a combination of the two Danish words ‘leg’ and ‘godt’ which means ‘play well’. Although his wooden toys were well made, he struggled to make a living, and then in 1947, when plastic was more readily available, Ole developed a modular truck that could be built and taken apart. In 1949 the Lego Group started producing interlocking building blocks with studs on the top, but they had difficulty with quality control. It was not until 1958 that the bricks that we know today were developed.
The present day models can be quite sophisticated with a wide variety of building blocks. LEGO is also used in high schools and universities teaching computer programming with the ‘Mindstorms’ range, and robotic competitions are held across the country.
The Sidney Museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and admission is by donation.
