Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO® Bricks

27 July 2017

Presenting world premiere of ten new skyscrapers from Sydney Living Museums

Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO® Bricks features 20 of the world’s most astonishing skyscrapers from Australia, Asia, Canada, USA and United Arab Emirates, constructed with breathtaking architectural detail and accuracy by Australia’s Ryan McNaught, the only certified LEGO professional in the Southern Hemisphere.

The exhibition, opening at the National Museum of Australia on 28 July, includes the world premiere of ten new towers, including Dubai’s stunning, tapered Burj Khalifa, Toronto’s CN Tower, Los Angeles’ Wilshire Grand Centre, Chicago’s Willis Tower, and New York’s famous landmarks — Empire State Building and Chrysler Building.

National Museum curator Martha Sear said the exhibition takes building with LEGO bricks to a new scale. ‘It will appeal to everyone who loves LEGO and has a passion for architecture and design. It will inspire young LEGO enthusiasts to push the limits of their imagination to build their own incredible models.’

Asian skyscrapers include Taiwan’s Taipei 101, Japan’s Tokyo Skytree, Kuala Lumpur’s twin Petronas Towers and Singapore’s extraordinary Marina Bay Sands. Australia is represented by the Eureka Tower in Melbourne, Infinity Tower in Brisbane and Sydney’s Barangaroo Crown Sydney Hotel Resort.

‘Visitors will appreciate the level of detail, the time, design and engineering which has gone into the towers. To see them all together, built out of LEGO bricks on the same scale, is quite amazing,’ Ms Sear said.

Built on a scale of 1:200 with stunning precision, the LEGO towers offer visitors a bird’s-eye view of the buildings, which are just as impressive in model size. Visitors can create their own ‘tower of tomorrow’ from over 200,000 loose LEGO bricks in hands-on construction areas.

Ryan McNaught is one of only 14 Certified LEGO professionals worldwide, modelling larger than life LEGO masterpieces. Mr McNaught and his team used more than half a million LEGO bricks (over 1.5 tons of LEGO) and took over 2,400 hours to build the structures in the Towers of Tomorrow exhibition.

‘I was thrilled to work with Sydney Living Museums on this first-of-its-kind exhibition. Creating two to four metre-high versions of these iconic buildings has been an incredible challenge, pushing the almost limitless possibilities of LEGO,’ Mr McNaught said.

Dr Caroline Butler-Bowdon, Director of Strategy and Engagement, Sydney Living Museums, said Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO® Bricks brings architecture and design to life in a wonderfully creative and engaging way and urges everyone to visit the exhibition at the National Museum.

‘This is the last chance to see these marvels before the exhibition embarks on a major tour of America,’ Dr Butler-Bowdon said.

Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO® Bricks at the National Museum of Australia – 28 July to 8 October 2017.

• How many LEGO bricks are used in this exhibition? More than 577,000
• How many hours did it take to build the LEGO Towers of Tomorrow? More than 2,400 – nearly six months of constant construction
• What is the rarest LEGO colour? Gold
• What is the most common LEGO colour? Trans-blue
• What is the most common brick? 2x4
• Which tower has the most LEGO bricks? Shanghai Tower (104,800 bricks)
• More than 400 billion bricks have been made since LEGO was first invented
• Invented in 1958, the LEGO brick is more than 55 years old
• LEGO Land – if LEGO mini-figures were people, they’d make up the largest population in the world - four billion have been made in the last 30 years
• Sky high – 40 billion LEGO bricks stacked one by one would reach from the earth to the moon
• Did you know? The first LEGO toys were made from wood instead of plastic
• Brain cruncher – 915,103,765 combinations can be created from just six 2x4 LEGO bricks.
• All the LEGO in this exhibition weighs more than 1.5 tons

Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO® Bricks is a travelling exhibition from Sydney Living Museums.

Media contact Tracy Sutherland, 02 6208 5338 | 0438 620 710 or media@nma.gov.au