Lego News #13
Sonya Choi Lee
Lego News #13 with news from Tuesday, March 19, 1996 to Monday, March 25,
1996.
- HEADLINE: Learning with Legos; Students, teachers and parents at Camelot
Elementary are teaching an old toy new tricks
Kindergartner Ryan Bowen gathers parts for the refrigeration system he's
building while 9-year-old Cody Lundgren uses a computer to raise and lower
a drawbridge.
Nearby, other children work on windmills, merry-go-rounds or other
creations, often with an able assistant named Mom, Dad or Grandpa.
The building materials have a familiar name and look, but in 1996
they're a lot more than the snap-together plastic pieces that have been a
familiar sight under Christmas trees and in children's playrooms for a
quarter century.
Today's Legos are high-tech complete with motors, gears and computer
software. And on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, kids and parents gather in
the computer lab at Camelot Elementary School in Lewiston to build with
them.
Ryan has a card that shows him how to build what might be a
refrigerator in real life. The card tells him which parts he needs and how
to put them together, step by step.
"This is my job; I hold his bucket," says his mother, Joan Bowen, while
following Ryan as he collects the needed materials.
"You're lucky," responds Darrell Lundgren. "(Cody) makes me go look."
Darrell accompanies Cody from 6 to 8 p.m. Thursday nights while Cody's
grandfather, Virg, joins him on Tuesday from 4 to 6 p.m.
"Grandpa and I get parts, and he puts it together," Darrell says. Cody
was the first kid to finish the Camelot Lego Logo Project Pyramid, a
worksheet listing a series of tasks. Kids begin by building projects using
cards showing them how. Next the kids program the computer to operate the
drawbridge or whatever they've built. Eventually they make their own
design and type a card with instructions for others who might want to
repeat it.
With Grandpa's help, Cody designed his own drawbridge. Then he
programmed the computer to make his drawbridge go up or down when he
clicks the computer's mouse.
"They catch on real fast," Darrell says.
"I think some of the parents feel intimidated," said sixth-grade
teacher Jim Harris, adding that some administrators and teachers do too.
Harris joins Debbie Kuntz, Camelot's educational technologist, on Thursday
nights to supervise the after-school Lego program. Teacher Mike Wilson
helps on Tuesdays.
This is the first year there's been a regular after-school program,
thanks to an $8,000 grant from the state. Other schools have expressed an
interest in the program, Harris said, but the costs can be discouraging.
Legos are a hot commodity, he said, and even second-hand stores hoard
them for Christmas. High-tech components are expensive. Motors can cost
$25 and interface cards, which link the Lego motor to the computer, cost
$250 each. On top of that, money is needed to pay salaries when the
programs run after school.
The program is funded until May, and school officials are looking for
money in the district budget.
Harris has been using Legos in the classroom for about eight years.
"It keeps me excited," Harris says. Legos are a staple when teaching
the simple motor unit to fifth-graders. But Harris and Kuntz would like to
see Legos expanded to all grade levels and other subject areas, such as
social studies. Kids can improve math and writing skills, they say, by
working out a budget for the project and keeping a journal on their
progress.
"It teaches them to follow instructions," said David Schmidt who was
helping his daughter Melissa, 8, design an automatic door. Schmidt's wife
and 7-year-old son also come on a regular basis. Schmidt applauds the
program for teaching kids about gears, pulleys, hydraulics and math.
People don't have to be regulars, Kuntz says; they can just show up and
start building. There's no requirement to finish any particular project.
The first few nights about 100 people attended. Now about 40 people show
up on a regular basis, Kuntz says, which is easier on the two supervisors.
"We wouldn't be able to do it without the parent support," Harris adds.
Kuntz is busy handing out battery packs and helping kids work out bugs
in their machines.
Randi Condrey, 10, and her sister Katie, 8, work together, splitting
the duties of picking up and putting away pieces.
"She made a really cool merry-go-round," Randi says of Katie. They have
Legos at home, Randi says, and they've used the plastic blocks to build
computers and a mouse.
Luke Lyon, 13, uses a battery pack to drive his Lego turtle while Randi
Condrey watches. The Lego turtle holds a pen that draws on paper as it
moves in various directions.
- WINDSOR. Children the world over have long used Lego bricks, those
colorful plastic building blocks, to construct whatever their imagination
could conjure up. Kids and grownups alike will be delighted to see what
can be created with 35 million of the little bricks--at the new Legoland
theme park outside London. In Miniland, the centerpiece of the park,
miniature cityscapes of London, Paris, Amsterdam, Edinburgh and Brussels
bustle with 800 plastic buildings and 700 models of people, trains, cars,
fountains, ships and bridges--all rendered in astonishing detail. But the
place is not just for looking: at the Imagination Center, workshops
teeming with thousands of Legos await budding designers. The park also
offers plenty of attractions that don't involve any plastic bricks--a
circus, mazes with hidden surprises, a driving school that lets older kids
zoom around in electric cars, a puppet theater and a fairground. Set on 60
landscaped hectares, Legoland opens next week.
- HEADLINE: LEGO; Kids' Toy Goes to School, Fits In Nicely as Educator
On a recent morning, sixth-grader Alexandra Lemonides spent science
class playing with Legos.
She built a miniature traffic light from Lego pieces, hooked it to a
computer and wrote a program to make the light switch from green to yellow
to green.
"This is getting a taste of technology and how things work," Alexandra
said.
Thirty-five years after a Danish toy company began selling Lego
building blocks in the United States, this remarkable toy is not only a
staple of playrooms across the country, but a favorite of teachers and
engineers, used in classrooms from preschool to college. Legos are
seemingly everywhere.
"It's the world's greatest engineering tool," explained mechanical
engineer Chris Rogers of Tufts University. "You can build pretty much
anything you want."
Consider, for example, the full-size Lego car, built with 650,000 tiny
pieces, displayed last week at the National Design Engineering Show at
McCormick Place.
Or consider "Lego Land," built by 11-year-old Matt Shaw of Palatine
with help from his father and grandfather. An entire little city in Matt's
bedroom, Lego Land includes Lego cars, boats, houses, a marina, a police
station and an airport.
"I'm happy he's into designing things," said Matt's father, Curtis.
"I'd rather have him do this than watch garbage TV."
What makes Legos so appealing, parents and teachers say, are their
versatility. There are more than 400 Lego sets, with 1,600 pieces that fit
together in countless ways. Two Lego bricks, each with eight connecting
nubs, can be fitted together 24 ways; three bricks, 1,060 ways.
Lego sets cost between $ 3 and $ 165, but competitors sell imitation
sets at lower prices. Some competing products are made with lower quality
plastic, however, and the pieces tend to crack and split, said a Legos
spokeswoman, Katherine Lee.
Preschool kids play with oversized pieces called Duplos, which include
colorful figures, mirrored blocks and animals that make rattle sounds.
Educators say playing with Duplos helps kids develop hand-eye
coordination; classify things by color, size and shape; work together
with other children; count, and learn basic principles such as gravity
and balance. About 300 Head Start and state-funded preschool classrooms
in Chicago use Duplos, said Sarah Barber of the Board of Education.
Until about age 6, the experts say, boys and girls spend about the
same amount of time playing with Duplos and Legos. Thereafter, many girls
lose interest.
"Boys like to build something, play with it a little bit, break it
down and build again," Lee said. "Girls don't like to deconstruct."
Last year, Lego introduced a new line for girls, with pastel colors
such as pink and light blue and softer pieces such as blankets and
clothes. The idea was to get girls to play house with Legos.
It flopped. Most stores have dropped the line, Lee said, but it's
still sold in catalogs.
Elementary schools use Legos to teach a simple computer programming
language, called Logo, invented by Seymour Papert of Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.
Children build Lego turtles, cars, merry-go-rounds and the like, then
write computer programs to operate them.
With funding from the Legos Group, Papert is developing new Lego
teaching products. In five to 10 years, he predicts, children will be
making Lego models that "not only move, but have intelligence."
Lego-Logo school kits cost $ 450, but Papert predicts the price will
drop for home use. "That's where it will really make a difference," he said.
NASA has given Tufts University a $ 550,000 grant to develop ways to
teach elementary students aerodyamics using Legos. Kids will build Lego
airplanes and use joysticks to test them in wind tunnels, Rogers said.
They might look to see how moving the airplane's flaps makes it go up or
down.
In some high schools, science students are using computer-controlled
Legos sets that include motors, gears, pulleys, levers, lights and
temperature sensors. A typical classroom experiment is to build a
miniature greenhouse and program the doors to open and shut to maintain a
constant temperature.
At the University of Notre Dame's "Lego Lab," students from different
engineering disciplines are teaming up to make such computer-controlled
Lego machines as a race car with a three-gear transmission and a CD
player that blares the first line of the Notre Dame fight song.
"Students were thrilled they could play with Legos for credit,"
recalled computer engineer Jay Brockman. "Almost everybody I know who
went into engineering played with Legos as a kid."
Don Sorenson, an engineer at Entron Controls Inc. in Carol Stream,
remembers playing with Legos when he was a boy. He and his buddies would
toss their creations down the stairs and see which ones held up best.
A few years ago, Sorenson was stumped on a real-life engineering
problem: how to build a control device for a client's welding machine.
Then he noticed his 3-year-old twins playing with their Legos.
Sorenson swiped the Legos and built a model of the welding machine,
which Design News magazine later declared to be one of the best technical
ideas of the year.
The Legos folks gave the twins a replacement set.
- HEADLINE: THE BUILDING OF THE BLOCKS
What they're made of: Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene, a tough plastic
also used for telephones, computer discs and auto parts.
How they're made: The plastic is heated to the consistency of bread
dough and pressed in molds under as much as 150 tons of pressure.
Why they fit: Legos are built to tolerances of 0.005 of a millimeter,
less than the diameter of a human hair. That ensures pieces fit together
snugly but can be pulled apart by a child.
Where the name came from: In 1934, Danish carpenter Ole Christiansen
needed a name for his new toy business. He combined two Danish words,
"leg godt" (play well), and the name Lego was born. Lego also means "I
assemble" in Latin.
Where the toy came from: In 1949, Christiansen introduced interlocking
plastic blocks that were the forerunners of today's Legos. The first
modern Legos came out in 1958; any piece made that year will fit any piece
made this year. Legos became a top seller in Europe; U.S. sales started
taking off when the company established an American sales branch in 1973.
- HEADLINE: The house Kirk built; This is the toy that charmed the kids
that pestered the parentsthat bought the bricks that built the firm that
made the Danes a billion
THERE is a strange machine in Denmark: it has a pneumatic steel jaw
and its job is to bite plastic bricks. It belongs to Lego, which reckons
that if children are going to bite its products, it had better do so
first. As the Lego motto has it, Det bedste er ikke for godt - only the
best is good enough.
Next week Legoland Windsor opens. It has cost pounds 85m, absorbed 25
million plastic bricks, and Kjell Kirk Kristiansen hopes that it will be
det bedste, or at least better than Disneyland Paris. Mr Kirk Kristiansen
has an interest in its success - not only is he president of Lego, he
(with his mum, his sister and his children) owns it.
This is only the second Legoland - the first opened in Jutland 28
years ago, and the Kristiansen family is not known for rushing into
decisions. But now it has decided to move, it is doing so with the
long-term confidence that only a giant, privately held company can.
Between now and 2050, it says, it will spend pounds 1.3bn on another 14
theme parks around the globe.
Everything about Lego smacks of steady Scandinavian progress. "It is
a dominant force - the only European-based toy manufacturer in the
world's top 10," says Oscar Henderson, assistant editor of Toy Trader
magazine. The other nine are all American, and they spend their time
merging, buying, selling, flitting from product to product, and from
country to country in an effort to find ever lower manufacturing costs.
Lego's main factories are in Denmark and Switzerland - it could hardly
have chosen higher-wage countries if it had tried. Its basic product has
remained the same since 1958, and the hesitation before it decided to
build more Legolands shows just how reluctant it is to stray away from
the areas it knows best.
It has also had astonishing management continuity. Mr Kirk
Kristiansen is the grandson of Lego's founder, Ole Kirk Christiansen (the
initial letters have mysteriously changed in the past 60 years). He runs
his company as though it were his family, even though it has 9,000
employees and a turnover approaching pounds 1bn. He is described as
friendly and intelligent, and is certainly fabulously wealthy. The family
is worth at least pounds 1bn, making it one of the richest in Europe.
But the fact that the theme park programme has been launched shows the
House of Lego knows that its foundations are not quite as solid as they
might appear. Precise financial results are impossible to obtain because
the company has two holding companies, one in Denmark and one in
Switzerland. This last was set up to avoid Danish restrictions on capital
movements, but it publishes no figures. However, the Danish company
suffered a fall in pre-tax profits in 1994 from Dkr795m (pounds 91m) to
Dkr697m (pounds 80m). The company admits that its pre-Christmas sales last
year were not good either, so we can expect more gloom when the Danish
part of the group reveals its 1995 figures next month.
A short-term drop in profits would not worry a company like Lego. But
the some of the factors behind it are disturbing. Lego sells itself as an
educational toy maker, and as such has managed to persuade parents to
shell out even when times are tough. Now however it has a rival for the
same parental wallets - electronic toys, CD Roms and even personal
computers. Sales of PCs have been booming, and Lego knows they have
diverted money from its more traditional pleasures.
No one could say the company was in crisis, or anywhere near it.
Sales of construction toys in the UK grew by 5 per cent last year, and
Lego has 70 per cent of that market. But the company's head-scratchers
must have wondered what they would have been without electronic rivals.
And it is possible to see the new Legoland as a sign that the company is
not convinced that the little plastic bricks will continue to enchant
children indefinitely.
The original park was built at the headquarters as a pragmatic
solution to the problem of children besieging the factory. "It was
starting to have an impact on production, so the company decided to build
models on some spare ground," says Michael Moore, head of marketing for
Lego UK. Legoland grew mighty, and has been visited by 25 million
people. Many cities have written begging for their own Legoland but it is
only recently that the Kristiansens have relented.
The Legoland programme is not exactly a diversification, but it is a
new leg to a stool that has so far been held up by plastic bricks alone.
It joins other less ostentatious new legs: Lego-branded clothes, books
that have Duplo (baby Lego) pieces attached. And, most interestingly, a
project to produce "virtual Lego" on a computer screen.
This last is key, because digital toys are the biggest threat to Lego
and every other physical toy. Computer games may have come and gone while
Lego has plodded on as ever. But they have had a long-term effect on the
expectations of children. "Video games gave children a lot of power,"
says Mr Moore. "They expect us to deliver that power as well."
But Lego did not get where it has without understanding such changes
and reacting to them. It has 60 people working on market research
worldwide and another 300 in product development. Lego has an
understanding of child psychology that universities would envy.
It is setting up two departments, one in Denmark and one in Britain,
to develop software that will bridge the gap between the physical and
computerised worlds. It is also preparing a CD Rom with the Californian
software company Mindscape, owned by Pearson, that will enable children
to build Lego toys "virtually". The aim is that they should design their
models on screen, then sit down on the floor to build them out of plastic.
The toy industry (and parents) hope children will not abandon the
physical world, and will settle down to a healthy mix of physical and
computer- based play. But Mr Moore says that if the children want only
virtual bricks, that is what Lego will offer. "Our mission is to produce
creative play material, not to make bricks," Mr Moore says. "I couldn't
imagine not producing them - but there is nothing in our philosophy that
says that couldn't happen."
This flexibility has been at the root of Lego's success. Founder Ole
Kirk Christiansen, an out-of-work carpenter from Billund in Jutland,
started making wooden toys in 1932 and two years later called his little
company Lego: leg godt means play well in Danish. The company was
adaptable from the start - it made yo-yos when they were in fashion, but
when the craze fizzled out it cut them in half to use as wheels on trucks.
After the Second World War, Ole's son Godtfred bought a plastic
extrusion machine from England.
Kiddikraft, a British toy company, was making plastic blocks so the
Kirk Christiansens modified the design just enough to avoid patent
problems and started producing them in 1949. Lego's "Automatic Binding
Bricks" had studs and were hollow underneath. But the little plastic
bricks did not set off on the road to real celebrity until the
mid-Fifties. In 1955 Lego System was launched, converting them from
frivolous playthings into desirable educational products. Then, three
years later, Godtfred thought up the idea of putting tubes inside them,
creating much greater rigidity. "The idea is essentially brilliant,
because it is simplicity itself and it is eminently flexible," Mr Moore
says. "The basic interlocking bricks can be used as a raw material like
sand and water."
In 1960 Lego stopped making wooden toys when its factory burnt down.
It also started selling in Britain. Aware that it had borrowed its
original design from Kiddikraft, it asked that company if it minded. "Oh
no," came the reply. "We gave up the bricks because they weren't selling."
In the Sixties children looked at Lego, all shiny and plastic, and at
the then-dominant Meccano, which clung to its "clean-cut young men in
shorts" image, and decided which they preferred. It was not long before
Meccano was overhauled.
Lego has made 110 billion pieces since 1949. Apart from the
introduction of tubes, there has been just one basic change in the
product since 1958. Early Lego bricks were made of cellulose acetate,
which had a habit of shrinking and discolouring. Since 1963, they have
been made of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene, or ABS, which does neither
of these things. It is heated to 450 degrees fahrenheit and then moulded
with a pressure of between 24 and 150 tons.
Most of Lego's patents ran out about 10 years ago, so anyone who
wants can clone a Lego brick. But, Mr Moore says: "We have had a number
of direct copiers - most have come, lasted a year or two, and
disappeared." This is largely because a Lego brick is not as easy to make
as it might seem. "Because the studs have to fit precisely between the
tubes, the tolerances need to be extremely good, or it won't work," Mr
Moore says. The allowable error on a brick is eight ten-thousandths of an
inch. And Lego takes no chances that its valuable moulds might be
half-inched - worn ones are interred in the concrete of new buildings.
But it was the ability to move with the minds of children that really
set Lego apart from other toy companies. It has always adapted, developed
and repackaged - appealing to each generation of children.
The biggest shift in the past 30 years has been "age compression" -
the trend among children to grow up, or think they have grown up, faster
than their predecessors have. "In the 1960s we could sell our classic red
and white blocks to children from four to 10," Mr Moore says. "Now we
wouldn't sell them to children over six."
That is not because older kids would not enjoy them, but because they
do not think they should enjoy them. "Eight- to 12-year-olds aspire to be
adults but at the same time want to be children," he says. "What they say
and what they do can be entirely different things." That is why new Lego
products that are seen to be "cool", but which are in reality
repackagings of the old favourites, are marketed every year.
The market is now carefully segmented, starting with Duplo, the giant
bricks for small children, moving on to Play Trains and Farms, then on to
the "classic" Lego, then on to themes such as Time Travel and Westerns,
and on to Lego Technic. This "advanced engineering system" has parts with
motors and silicon chips. And Lego now makes software that controls
models by a remote control. The idea is that students learning computing
can see their programmes having a physical effect - steering a caror
controlling a robot.
Lego's head-scratchers have even developed a theory explaining why
the product sells well in northern European countries, but not in the
south. "There is a fit between Lego and the way the society is built,"
Mr Moore says. The idea of building a society gradually is a northern
European one, which is why a toy that needs patience and puts a child
under some pressure is popular. Of Latin countries, Mr Moore says: "Toys
that do things immediately are better received in these countries." A
Euromonitor survey shows that in Germany construction toys account for
8.8 per cent of the toy market, while in Spain they take only 1.5 per
cent. The mixed culture UK's figure is 5 per cent, fitting Lego's theory
neatly.
Does it matter that Lego is family-owned? Yes, Mr Moore says. There
are the obvious advantages of being free of stock market pressures, but
the structure also suits the culture. "You can tell a Lego man," he
believes. "He will have a certain style that has a lot to do with the
fact that his market is children. The company's beliefs are very much to
do with doing the right thing for children."
But however hard Lego tries, it has never succeeded in giving
children what they really want. "We've occasionally wondered if we could
build deconstruction kits," Mr Moore says. "They would just be meant for
knocking down." (Sonya: Sounds like the Nebula Outpost to me! :) )
- L85m LEGOLAND BUILDS UP FOR BIG OPENING By Alan Jones, Industrial
Correspondent, PA News Staff at a new L85 million theme park were today
taking part in final rehearsals ahead of next week's official opening.
Legoland will open to the public on Friday when visitors will see
exhibits, displays and attractions made from 25 million lego bricks.
Local schoolchildren will perform the opening ceremony at Legoland which
is based on the site of the former Windsor Safari Park in Berkshire,
overlooking Windsor Castle. The park, the first Legoland outside
Denmark, employs more than 600 people many of whom were today putting
final touches to shows and themed areas. A giant dinosaur, made of
250,000 lego bricks and dubbed "Legosaurus" by its designers, stands at
the entrance to the park. A Legoland spokeswoman said: "We are waiting
expectantly for visitors on Friday and can promise them exceptional value
and high standards of quality and service." The park contains 17 rides,
21 attractions and five live shows as well as a huge area where children
can build their own lego models.
- HEADLINE: Falling Lego fells candidate
A DISTRICT board by-election candidate was recovering in Eastern
Hospital yesterday after she was hit on the head by a piece of Lego that
fell from a tower block.
Democratic Party member Leung Suk-ching was injured while she was
delivering leaflets to voters in North Point on Friday morning.
"I am still suffering from a headache. It is very unlucky, but it
won't affect my determination in the election," she said yesterday. "I
will work even harder."
Ms Leung's campaign manager, Chris Wong Sing-fai, said the police
were investigating, "but they said it was hard to find out where the
plastic toy fell from".
Ms Leung is facing independent Tsang On-ki and Shek Kwei-chun from
the Liberal Party in the by-election for Kam Ping constituency next
Sunday.
The seat has been vacant since independent Chiang Yu-tui was
convicted in January of creating phantom voters to help him win the 1994
election. He was sentenced to a three-month suspended jail term and fined
$ 10,000.
- HEADLINE: TRAVEL - DEPARTURE POINTS: Learning curves at Legoland
Christopher Middleton meets the Windsor modellers making round shapes out
of square bricks
THERE can't be many jobs which involve you doing exactly what you used
to do when you were five. Actors are perhaps an exception; doctors and
nurses to a lesser degree. But you wouldn't have thought making models out
of Lego bricks really counted as full-time adult employment.
Nevertheless, that is exactly how Nick Collins, 22, and Jennifer Dodwell,
25, spend their working day - and have done for the past 2 1/2 years.
They sit in a small, bright factory beside a railway arch in Windsor, and
their task is to feed the giant Legoland park, which opens next Friday,
with a constant diet of life-sized Lego creatures. Nick, for example, has
just created a 5ft-high Scandinavian troll (green and blue body, big red
beard), while Jennifer is starting on a yellow-helmeted fireman, having
recently completed her masterwork - a reclining Sleeping Beauty complete
with trailing ballgown and dark brown Lego tresses. It's when you see the
hair that you acknowledge for the first time there might be something more
to their job than just play. Defying the fact that all Lego bricks have
square edges, somehow Jennifer has managed to create a bouffant wave that
is all about curves and swirl rather than squares and rectangles.
Delicate little curls dangle so realistically they look as if they have
been frozen in place by a fairy's hairspray. Which they have - in a way.
For although it is a foundation stone of the Legoland creed that all its
exhibits have been made with exactly the same pieces as you can buy in the
shops, using exactly the same methods as any little boy or girl anywhere
in the world, this is in fact the tiniest of tiny fibs. Because there is
one ingredient which the Lego model-makers employ that no sensible mummy
or daddy would ever let their little ones use. Glue. And not just any
glue, but a fierce, nasty kind of glue, so woozy-making that it cannot be
just left lying around in pots. Instead, it has to be pumped in via a
network of overhead tubes and out through a tiny pull-down nozzle that
operates like a dentist's drill. Remarks about recreational glue-sniffing
are stamped on quickly. "We take this matter very seriously indeed,"
scolds spokeswoman Helen Matthews. "All our model-makers receive training
in the use of glue. Excessive exposure can in some cases lead to brain
damage." This job is not just difficult, it is dangerous, too. Would it
not be better all round just to say "no" to adhesives? The factory's admin
manager Gary Morgan shakes his head in an it's-not-as-simple-as-that kind
of way. "Look at this," he says, pointing to a 4ft-square dinosaur torso,
minus head and tail. "How could all this hold together without glue?" He
has a point. Peering into the monster's stomach cavity, you can make out
hundreds of dislodged bricks lying in the pit of the beast's belly. You
can also see the criss-cross of Lego scaffolding that prevents the great
weight of the creature's hide from collapsing in on itself. "If these
struts give way," warns Gary, "the whole lot falls in. And that can mean
hundreds of hours' work."
Out on the park itself, one quickly grasps the need for glue. The finished
dinosaur, whose prototype ribcage sits back at the factory, now stands
four square at the top of the hill, in the teeth of an icy gale. A
quarter-of-a-million bricks, and a neck 10ft long and just begging for
teenagers to hang on it - why, you don't so much need glue as reinforced
steel rivets. For the dinosaur's makers, it's comforting to know that when
the park closes for the winter, their baby will be brought indoors, as
will all the other Lego figures. Big and small, dinosaurs and damsels,
5ft-high trolls and 5cm-high toddlers - all will be packed up snug in
bubble-wrap till spring, leaving Big Ben, Sacre Coeur and all the other
miniaturised European landmarks to fight off Jack Frost's probing fingers.
Safer, in some cases, than when they are in the factory, where breakages
are not uncommon. "Lego hitting the floor has this unmistakable sound,"
winces Nick. "Everyone always cheers, like when a waiter drops a plate.
Sometimes, though, it's not your fault. One day, one of the cleaners broke
a fairy's arm; that was bad - it can take two days to do an arm." Seven
years is reckoned to be the natural outdoor lifespan of a Lego creature.
After that, the plastic starts to lose its colour. Sooner, in the case of
the cream-coloured bricks. The what? Yes, if you're in any way
Lego-literate, you will know that you can't actually buy cream-coloured
bricks in the shops. Blue, red, green, yellow, brown (at a pinch) - but
not cream. So where now the anyone-could-make-these-things promise? Step
forward Gary, fingering collar. "It is, er, true that cream is not
available to the public," he begins. "However, we do hope people will
understand that in many cases, this was the only way in which we could
realistically recreate well-known buildings." Hmm, suppose it makes sense.
A Houses of Parliament in rampant red or royal blue might be seen as a
sign of bias. Not that you get that problem with mythical beasts. What
exercises the artist in those cases is not what colour to use, but how to
do all the fiddly bits, like bony fingers or a hairy beard. In all, Nick's
troll took him 170 hours to put together, not to mention the 160 he spent
building the prototype. Working from an initial sketch, the
construction-planning process is slow, with the designer having to plot
each brick on a large grid known, rather unglamorously, as a nobb sheet.
There are no fixed qualifications for the job, and past Lego experience
tends to have been rather a long time ago. But the company puts recruits
through a six-to eight week training course, and many of them, including
Nick and Jennifer, hold a Higher National Diplomas in model-making (he
from St Albans, she from Rochester). At their job interview, they were
both given a pile of bricks and asked to build something. "I think I had
25 minutes to do an elephant," recalls Jennifer, whose contribution to
Legoland includes, as well as Sleeping Beauty, a couple of Red Riding
Hoods, two Gretels (for two Hansels) and one Lego-brick house for the
Three Little Pigs. "It's possible to make anything with Lego, really," she
says, finally. "It's just a matter of learning how to do the curves."
Foundations Getting there Legoland Windsor is on the B3022 between Windsor
and Bracknell. It will be open daily from March 29 to September 29, 10am
to 6pm (8pm July and August). There are pounds 85 million-worth of rides
and attractions, spread over 40 acres. Admission Adults pounds 15;
children pounds 12; senior citizens pounds 11 ( pounds 1 discount per
person if you book three days or more in advance). Further information
Legoland Windsor 0990 626375; for booking, phone 0990 626364. Entrance is
only guaranteed if you have booked.
- HEADLINE: Plastic men, plastic cats and dogs; Britain's newest theme park
doesn't officially open until Friday. But Tracey Garner got a sneak
preview, thanks to her son Jack
Modern-day theme parkery is a funny business. We send a Brit, Trevor
Davies, to mastermind the year-long culture thrill ride in Copenhagen,
European Capital of Culture for 1996. In return, Denmark sends us
Legoland. The maker of the plastic bricks has a long-established
original in Billund, a small town in the middle of Jutland (and nowhere).
The Danish invasion is the latest attack in the theme park war that is
gathering momentum and g-forces across England, a country already endowed
with a much higher occurence of thrills per hectare. Can Denmark's
audacious opening next week - so close to Her Majesty's home - attract
the nation's fun-seekers? I took my son Jack, aged eight, to find out.
Lions, polar bears, lizards and the like can still be found on the
old Windsor Safari Park site, but these are now creatures of the Lego
kind - painstakingly pieced together out of millions of those little
plastic bricks, which many a mother will recognise as the things that
hurt like hell when you tread on them and are a nightmare to get out of
the Hoover's innards. The preview day on Saturday, ahead of next Friday's
public opening, was exclusively for members of the Lego Club. It was
billed as an opportunity to road test the park - in trade terms, a "soft
opening" to iron out problems before the big day. Pay the discounted
admission of pounds 10, and be among the first kids on the new blocks.
So all the people who flooded in at 10am last Saturday were already
Lego aficionados. The models certainly lived up to their expectations.
Attention to detail is paramount: bright plastic birds in the trees, an
injection- moulded boy attempting to retrieve his kite from the roof of a
building, even a built-by-numbers dog relieving himself against a real
tree. Twenty million bricks alone are used to recreate the cities of
Europe, not counting the ones that are no doubt stuck down the back of
the company sofa.
But putting the bricks to one side for a moment, what else is there to
do at this latest addition to our growing band of theme parks? If you go
expecting white knuckle rides and roller coasters, you'll be sadly
disappointed. Rides are few and far between, and unashamedly aimed at the
under-12s. The chance to drive your own Lego car (with the promise of a
driving licence at the end of it) and piloting a boat along a snaking
river were probably the most popular attractions, and the queues built up
quickly. A hot summer Sunday could be quite an ordeal.
There are several areas for children to play with bricks. One excited
chap grasped a couple of motorbikes, vrooming them enthusiastically along
a mini road with full sound effects blasting from his mouth, while his
son played quietly in the corner. As ever, the children's adventure play
area fails in the way of many theme parks: a serious lack of seating for
parents (the ones who don't happen to be playing with bricks).
Every theme park has to have live entertainment, and Legoland's are a
mixed bag. The harbour show was superb, with five enthusiastic sailors
enacting the Mystery of the Missing Lego Bricks (down the back of the
sofa, surely?), and leaping into freezing water from the top of a 30ft
lighthouse to rapturous applause. It's probably best to draw a veil over
the other shows in the hope that when "Overture and Beginners" is called
on opening night, the acts will have been polished up.
And beware of the maze: it's not as tame as first appearances might
have you believe. The Danes obviously get a kick out of sending jets of
water up the trouser legs of unsuspecting visitors. Few found it funny on
a freezing March afternoon, including the toddler found in the ladies
toilet whose Mum was desperately trying to dry off his clothes under the
hand dryer.
The Lego Shop - which is strategically positioned at the exit -
stocks an unequalled range of all things Lego; from computer mouse mats
to a pounds 35 tie. But from about 4pm onwards the shop and its tills
seemed inadequate under the challenge of hoards of departing visitors
digging deep into their pockets. I'm sure I wasn't alone in promising my
eight year old a trip to Toys 'R' Us the next day instead of standing in
the unmoving queue.
When it came to sampling the restaurants and cafes we breathed a sigh
of relief that we'd opted to bring our own picnic. Queues did trail out
of the doors, but as the day was heavily billed as "a chance for us to
try out procedures", grumbles about inexperienced staff and equipment
failure can be forgiven as teething problems.
However, the most important opinions are surely those of loyal Lego
Club members. Eight-year-old Jack, who should own shares in Lego if the
thousands of bricks piled up in his bedroom are anything to go by, had
this to say: "I thought the models were excellent. They had lots of
detail, lights flashed on them and some moved, like the giant spiders
legs. My favourite models were in the Technic rock 'n' roll band which
were worked by a Lego mechanical system. It must have taken years and
years to build all the models. The shop should be bigger to take all the
people. The panning for gold, which cost pounds 1, made my hands cold,
but I got a Lego medal for the gold I collected. I loved my driving
lesson, but I was sad there weren't any big rides like the ones at Thorpe
Park."
It's good to welcome a new theme park to add to the "How do we
entertain the kids over this school holiday" list, but Legoland Windsor's
failure to provide enough entertainment for the adults and older kids
bodes ill for return visits - seen it, done it, what's next?
Starting blocks:
Legoland Windsor (0990 626375) opens to the public at 10am on Friday
morning and daily thereafter until the end of September, plus weekends and
half-term in October. The park closes at 6pm, with late opening to 8pm in
July and August. Adults pounds 15, children aged 4-15 pounds 12, aged 3 or
under free. Discounts of pounds 1 if you book in advance on 0990 626364.
- HEADLINE: British Legoland builds a model system for the next generation
The British Legoland that opens to the public next week adds a hefty
block of state-of-the-art technology to the 30-year-old plastic building
bricks.
Children visiting the new centre in the old Windsor Safari Park will
learn how to control model dinosaurs, bridges and pirate islands using
the latest computer technology.
Up to 128 at a time will be able to take part in one of four workshop
sessions on anything from the way gears work to how tall buildings
withstand earthquakes. In the latter session, Lego towers the children
have built themselves can be shaken to pieces on a scale-model earthquake
table that simulates the real thing.
Older children will be able to build remote-sensing models which can,
using Lego's own Dacta computer system running on Apple Macintosh
machines, perform complex simulations of real-life situations, such as
the detection of intruders or the approach of a boat to a bridge.
After about 45 minutes spent in a workshop, being guided through the
the system by trained Legoland staff, the children are sent out into the
theme park to see how similar systems are used to control its model
dinosaurs, ships and bridges.
''Lego has a philosophy we call 'serious fun','' says Hanna Bornstein,
who has spent the past two years developing the Legoland Windsor schools
programme. ''We believe in children learning while they're here but not
in too stuffy a way they should have fun first and we have tried our best
to make the learning part of their day as interesting as possible.''
The workshop part of the visit is undertaken using 32 Apple Mac
Performa computers, which are connected to the proprietary Lego Dacta
control boxes. Children are given all the Lego bricks, wires, control
units and motors they need to build a particular model. Using instruction
booklets, they build the model, then connect the wires to the computer
and control box.
They then use the mouse to choose on-screen options to, for example,
test their wiring or operate individual elements of a model raise a
bridge or start a model carousel, for example. They can also start a
software recorder to build up a complicated series of events which the
computer remembers then replays as often as they wish.
The software and some of the small models such as dinosaurs, the
pirate island and the carousel can be bought by schools or even parents
from Legoland for further educational use, for about Pounds 300-Pounds
400. The software is available for Apple Mac, IBM PC-compatible and Acorn
computers.
''We have various aims with the different workshops, depending on the
age of the children,'' Bornstein says. ''For example, the computer
control key stage 3 project is aimed at 11 to 13-year-olds, the oldest we
generally take.
''It is designed to teach the children about two types of computer
control sequenced and feedback. Sequenced is when a computer is used to
store a set of instructions which is repeated over and over again, as in
a set of traffic lights or a washing machine. Feedback is when a computer
reacts to input from a sensor. It could be a heat sensor in a greenhouse,
which will open the windows when the temperature reaches a certain level,
or a street light that switches on when it gets dark.
''In the models the children make, they can build up a sequence
which, for instance, raises and lowers a barrier to allow model figures
into a carousel and then turns the carousel. Or they can use light
sensors to detect when an unwanted model arrives and the barrier needs to
be lowered to prevent him entering.
In another workshop, children aged 9-11 are introduced to the concept
of computer control and build a walking, talking, fire-breathing dinosaur
or a pirate island. They are also taught about the park's robot orchestra
as an illustration of sequence control the human-sized robots, built
entirely of lego bricks, play different tunes based on input from members
of the audience, who press large pads placed around the bandstand.
In the theme park itself, extensive use is made of computer control
systems to run the various attractions, particularly the models in
''Miniland'', where many famous structures around the world are
reproduced in Lego, including our own Tower Bridge. Simon Henderson has
been working for two years on the operation, which is based on the Ladder
system developed for the hard-wired controlling of computerised systems
such as traffic lights and office air conditioning.
''We use an ordinary IBM PC-compatible laptop to make changes to the
Eprom (Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory) chips which do the actual
controlling,'' he explains. ''We just plug it into the bank of Eproms,
write the new control programme, unplug the laptop and away we go.''
Even the sounds emanating from the models are digitally-processed and
stored on Eprom chips. ''Each can hold about two minutes' worth of
sound,'' Henderson says.
Lego chose to use the hard-wired Eproms rather than a software-based
system because of its reliablility and because a similar system is
already in operation at the original Legoland at Billen in Denmark.
The Danes are so impressed with the computerised educational system
that they're going to introduce it in Billen. It will also be included in
the Legoland being built in California.
The British schools programme was developed by Bornstein in
consultation with more than 1,000 teachers and the Berkshire Local
Education Authority, which covers the Windsor area.
''We've developed it to support the National Curriculum in the design
and technology, information technology, science and cross-curricular
areas,'' she says.
All teachers who want to use the workshop programmes are given full
background notes to prepare their class for the visit, worksheets they
can use during the visit if they wish and follow-up material so topics
can be continued in the schools.
Legoland at Windsor opens on Friday, March 29. Admission, 10am-to 6pm
(8pm in July and August), is Pounds 15 for adults, Pounds 12 for
children, Pounds 11 for seniors, with a Pounds 1 reduction for advance
bookings (excluding Sundays and Bank Holidays). The school rate is Pounds
6 for teachers and pupils. Further information from the Group Sales
Office, Legoland Windsor, Winkfield Road, Windsor, Berks SL4 4AY; tel:
01753 626100; fax: 01753-626200. Further information about the schools
programme from Lego's education officer, Lorna Scott, on 01753-626104.
- HEADLINE: Her Majesty's new kingdom, built of little white bricks
The Queen will have to get used to a very different view from her
rooms at Windsor Castle. New neighbours have moved in. And if she trains
her sovereign binoculars on the Berkshire land that was once home to
wandering zebras and wildebeest, Her Majesty might spot scale
reproductions of St Paul's Cathedral and Big Ben. The explanation? On 29
March, the former site of Windsor Safari Park reopens to the public, as
Legoland Windsor.
It will be "the ultimate Lego experience", the toy company claims -
an entire theme park dedicated to the eponymous building brick, with Lego
models and activity "zones" designed to stimulate and entertain.
Lego bought the 150-acre site after Windsor Safari Park closed in
1992, having been forced into receivership with pounds 40m debts. "We
selected Windsor from 1,000 possible sites in the UK. The image fitted
with Lego very well," explains the project's Canadian managing director,
Robert Montgomery. As part of the deal, the receivers were obliged to
find homes for the park's 600 animals and Lego committed itself to
regenerating the area, which had fallen into disrepair. "Much of the site
was in need of environmental protection and repair," Mr Montgomery
explains. Extensive work has been undertaken to restore the woodland.
"Our intention was always to create a natural and scenic attraction for
our guests and neighbours."
But Lego inherited more than it bargained for. The Mansion House,
built in the centre of the park in 1751, was once the Kennedy residence,
when Joe Kennedy served as US ambassador to the United Kingdom. When work
started on the site two years ago, local contractors reported discovering
"dozens" of bugging devices secreted throughout the building - whether of
US or UK origin, no one knows.
The site also revealed other mementoes of former occupants. Such as
the skeleton of a killer whale unceremoniously buried in an unmarked
grave. And "toxic" hippo dung - the central lake was once the hippo
pool: when dredged, 600 tons of the stuff were removed. The hoard has
been left to decompose in a quiet corner until fit for use as fertiliser.
Forty acres were eventually landscaped. The site is now divided into
separate zones. Miniland is fashioned entirely from Lego: it has taken
three years, 100 model-makers and 25 million bricks to build. Many of the
800 models are animated, complete with sound effects. Then there is the
Imagination Centre, with computer rooms available for school parties; and
the Duplo Gardens for younger children, with Lego helicopters, boat rides
and water games, and two driving schools with electric cars that kids can
drive.
My Town, a group of life-sized buildings, huddles around a harbour
stage for an hourly live-action stunt show. And at the far end of the site
lie the Wild Woods, where children can ride a flume or play in a
labyrinthine system of tree-top walkways, scramble-nets and chutes. Each
"zone" is separated by a "quiet area" for children to calm down in.
Between trees and early spring flowers, Lego pheasants and Lego fox cubs
roam.
The first Legoland, at Billund in Denmark, opened to the public in
1968 and has drawn almost 25 million visitors since. Lego hopes to
attract a similar volume of visitors to the British version. Mr
Montgomery expects families will spend around six hours each visit. But
to avoid queues and prevent overcrowding, the aim is to limit access to a
maximum of 15,000 visitors at any time.
Sponsorship may be a commercial necessity for all theme parks, but
here, Mr Montgomery claims, the Lego approach differs. The park - which
has cost pounds 85m to develop - was funded entirely from cash flow; Lego
prefers not to borrow from banks. "By working with only a few like minded
partners - Ford, Apple, Cow&Gate - we can add extra value," he says.
Ford's sponsorship of the driving school - where commercial involvement
is most blatant - is only a concession to realism, he insists.
Legoland Windsor must quickly pay its way: a target of 1.4 million
visitors in the first year has been set. Despite being the only theme
park catering for under-15s, Legoland has a firm eye on the opposition.
Entrance fees are set just below other parks' prices - pounds l5 for an
adult and pounds l2 for a child, compared with pounds 17 and pounds 13 at
Alton Towers. Hardly a cheap family day out. But already 250,000 tickets
have been sold on the strength of the Lego name alone. It may be child's
play, but Lego takes its business very seriously indeed.
- Leslie Wolfe's project that encouraged children to think logically and
sequentially to design robotics. The grant was written to augment a
previous project. Students demonstrated to the board their creations made
from Lego Dacta block sets. A revolving stage, moving elevator, line
drawing machine and a moving dinosaur were created.
- "The Snappy Block Organizer" that second-grader Stephen Schreiner, 8,
invented lets him automatically store his Legos by size and shape.
- Twenty-one percent of Czech children aged four to 15 said Lego bricks
were their favourite toy, while 16 percent said stuffed toys, according to
a survey last December by the IMAS-MarCon company.
Sonya
With Special Thanks to Robert E. and Z.C. J. for their help.
New and old issues of Lego News are available at:
Jeff Thompson
>
> Everything about Lego smacks of steady Scandinavian progress. "It is
> a dominant force - the only European-based toy manufacturer in the
> world's top 10," says Oscar Henderson, assistant editor of Toy Trader
> magazine. The other nine are all American, and they spend their time
> merging, buying, selling, flitting from product to product, and from
> country to country in an effort to find ever lower manufacturing costs.
> Lego's main factories are in Denmark and Switzerland - it could hardly
> have chosen higher-wage countries if it had tried. Its basic product has
Obviously this writer doesn't read r.t.l and doesn't know about the
supposed catastrophic drop in design quality that gets ranted about
here so often. :)
> Kiddikraft, a British toy company, was making plastic blocks so the
> Kirk Christiansens modified the design just enough to avoid patent
> problems and started producing them in 1949. Lego's "Automatic Binding
> Bricks" had studs and were hollow underneath.
This is fascinating - I've never seen a reference to a plastic brick
line that served as inspiration for the "Automatic Binding Bricks."
> The biggest shift in the past 30 years has been "age compression" -
> the trend among children to grow up, or think they have grown up, faster
> than their predecessors have. "In the 1960s we could sell our classic red
> and white blocks to children from four to 10," Mr Moore says. "Now we
> wouldn't sell them to children over six."
Hmmm .. thus is explained the death of "Basic" line and the birth
of the more childish Freestyle sets.
>
> That is not because older kids would not enjoy them, but because they
> do not think they should enjoy them. "Eight- to 12-year-olds aspire to be
> adults but at the same time want to be children," he says. "What they say
> and what they do can be entirely different things." That is why new Lego
> products that are seen to be "cool", but which are in reality
> repackagings of the old favourites, are marketed every year.
Which explains why they seem to be leaning towards a two year product
line rather than a three year product line.
Much thanks to Sonya and her friends for their efforts in bringing
this series of posts to r.t.l -- thanks!! Very enjoyable to read.
--
je...@teubner.com "Float on a river, forever and ever, Emily."
Javier Ramos
>the product sells well in northern European countries, but not in the
>south. "There is a fit between Lego and the way the society is built,"
>Mr Moore says. The idea of building a society gradually is a northern
>European one, which is why a toy that needs patience and puts a child
>under some pressure is popular. Of Latin countries, Mr Moore says: >"Toys
>that do things immediately are better received in these countries." A
>Euromonitor survey shows that in Germany construction toys account for
>8.8 per cent of the toy market, while in Spain they take only 1.5 per
>cent. The mixed culture UK's figure is 5 per cent, fitting Lego's >theory
>neatly.
From my own experience I have a better explanation. In Spain, in spring and
summer I hardly played with my LEGO, I used to be outdoors because weather
is usually fine, biking, playing football, swimming, building huts in the
woods or whatsoever. In northern Europe you have a lot of lousy weather
days, you can only keep yourself indoors (Eeek! this morning, here in the
Netherlands, the channels were frozen again...), the competition then is
with TV.
Javier