Video: Watch a designer build La Sagrada Familia out of Lego bricks

Godtfred Kirk Christiansen submitted the very first patent for the Lego brick 66 years ago, on Jan. 28, 1958.

Since then, Lego has become a household name worldwide, and Statista estimated the brand value surpassed $11.8 billion in value in 2022.

Bricks McGee, a “Lego workshop company,” reported that Lego produces roughly 60 billion Lego bricks every year in its factories in Denmark, Hungary, Vietnam, China, Mexico and the Czech Republic.

The group also estimated in 2022 that the Lego mini figure population has grown to the size of over half the world’s human population. In the weeks leading up to Christmas, the company sells 30 Lego sets per second, the site reported.

While many Lego lovers prefer building predesigned sets, some create their own designs.

For example, in 2021, Nicky Heys completed an 18-month project replicating La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Spain. He posted a time-lapse video of the final construction process to YouTube, inspiring fellow Lego lovers around the world.

In the video, Heys puts together over 30 sections he’d previously constructed in a time lapse. He zooms in on the open back of the building to show a spiral staircase, a chandelier, rows of pews and stained glass.

He explained the design process: “The initial set out and scale was a combination of obtaining proportions from plan and trying to make the model the appropriate scale for Lego figures. Needed to restart a couple of times to re-scale. The floor plan in now based on a 8 x 8 (stud) column to column grid.”

Related

• La Sagrada Familia nears completion after 141 years

One commenter wrote, “Fantastic!! the best I’ve seen so far!!! And my most dearest memory is visiting the Sagrada five years ago,” to which Heys responded, “Thank you so much! Glad it brought back happy memories.”