The Cold War Museum

Thank you for visiting the Cold War Museum project at Brickworkz.com! Below is a web log recorded for posterity with photos taken during the progress of the creation of the Cold War Museum logo in 20,745 LEGO parts. Please enjoy, give us your feedback and feel free to share this blog with family and friends!

Play well,

With the design approved, I began working on the bottom-left corner of the logo. It passed the time while greeting visitors at Brickfest. Many people came by to see what I was working on, and I told them about the upcoming museum.

The first plate was completed within a few hours of starting. Making sure I was on-the-mark was crucial here, since every piece in the mosaic would be based on the exact location of every pixel on this plate. I was continually interrupted from working to answer questions (which was fine) but I kept losing my place and starting over again. When Brickfest closed for the day, I went ahead and got started with the second plate.

Before the upcoming Brick Party, I knew it would be wise to do the calculations and get the circle exactly on-point before turning the design loose to different people. It took a little time (and a lot of table space!) but I managed to lay the plates out and complete the outer and inner rings.

On the night of the brick party, some of my trusty helpers made quick work of the reds and blues. Chris made the football (top, center) in honor of the Tech football game that weekend. This was a progress shot taken about an hour into the evening.

Just a quick thank-you to some of my friends who helped with the building of this mosaic. See more about them in the newly-created 'helperZ' section.

While I was working on the razor wire of the Berlin Wall, Jeff, Olivia, Chris, Karen, Chris and Jennifer were helping to fill in the solid areas of color into the areas I had previously cordoned off. It was a great system! They were a huge help. I worked some more the next day on the razor wire and the other side of the wall. Jeff helped touch-up the blues to finish another plate for the piece.

Shortly after the Brick Party, the mosaic design was reviewed. After some scrutiny, my client and I decided that it would be best to have the LEGO mosaic more closely follow the original Cold War Museum logo. In short, all the reds needed to be switched to blue and vice-versa.

It took about 15 hours to replace all of the colors correctly, but a lot of good came out of this:

• First, and foremost, it was the right thing to do. The revision was going to be tedious, but we aim to please, and getting the job done right is the only way we do it.
• It makes a lot more symbolic sense with "red" on the other side of the wall - especially with the Soviet hammer and sickle. That would have looked strange over blue.
• Dismantling the colors bought me some time so that the project could get some exposure during an interview I was scheduled to have with the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Turns out, it got some great coverage! (check that out on the HeadlineZ page)
• With the colors missing, I had an entire pallette to build, taking advantage of the web cam in the studio. The full time lapse will be seen in another entry!

When the logo design needed the colors switched, I took advantage of the studio cam and created this time-lapse video of the progress. A shot was taken every 45 seconds as I (re)built the Cold War Museum logo in LEGO bricks. Please enjoy, and don't miss some of the other LEGO mosaic time-lapse videos we've done at the Brickworkz studio.

Thanks for visiting the Cold War Museum project! If you are interested in a LEGO mosaic of your own, or know someone who would flip over a unique holiday gift, let us know so we can get a jump on the holiday rush!

Don't forget to support the Cold War Museum, and thank you again for visiting!