Everything you need to know about LEGO Ideas 21332 The Globe

The latest LEGO Ideas set has just been revealed, so from its price to its release date, here’s everything you need to know about 21332 The Globe.

Perhaps the worst-kept secret of 2022 so far has been the arrival of 21332 The Globe, which first appeared in a leaked LEGO catalogue earlier this month. The LEGO Group has now finally lifted the lid on the LEGO Ideas set, giving us our first official look at the huge blue and green sphere (take that, flat-Earthers).

If you’re keen to learn more about everything 21332 The Globe has to offer – from whether it uses stickers to its one and only function – dive in below…

It’s a milestone LEGO Ideas set

This is the 40th LEGO Ideas set to date, and while 40 maybe isn’t as nice a round number as 50 or 100, it’s still worth celebrating. In wedding circles, 40 is known as the ruby anniversary, so maybe you could add a tiny red LEGO gem to the base of 21332 The Globe or something. We’re just spitballing here.

It’s based on a design by Guillaume Roussel

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France-based builder Guillaume Roussel is the man responsible for bringing 21332 The Globe to shelves. He submitted his original design to LEGO Ideas on February 3, 2020, and it took only a day over three months to rack up the 10,000 votes required to advance to the review stage. The LEGO Group then gave it the green light in September 2020, as part of the first 2020 review.

It uses more pieces than the original submission

Roussel’s pitch to LEGO Ideas used just 2,060 bricks, plates and tiles to bring his globe to life, while the LEGO Group’s 21332 The Globe comes in at 2,585 pieces. That’s a difference of 525 elements (quick maths), and given how similar the two models appear from the outside, the majority of the extra bricks have surely gone into making the set stable internally.

It’s (approximately) to scale

According to the instruction manual for 21332 The Globe, the set is built to roughly 1:48,000,000 scale. While the LEGO Group hasn’t been brave enough to provide an estimate for how many pieces you’d need to build a 1:1 scale world, it would apparently take 1,252,343,750 2×4 bricks laid out end to end to span the equator.

Its tiles are printed – and glow in the dark

Good news: there are absolutely no stickers in 21332 The Globe. Each and every one of its tiles signifying the name of a continent or ocean is printed, and all of those on the globe itself (so, bar the one on the base) glows in the dark. Maybe don’t put this one on display in your bedroom, then…

It spins

Let’s face it: the first thing you’re going to want to do once you’ve put the finishing touches on 21332 The Globe is (quite literally) take it for a spin. Fortunately, the design team has pre-empted that inevitability, which means that, yes, the world genuinely does spin on its axis.

It’s big

The plates and wedge pieces used to construct the sphere’s panels are essentially the same as those used in Roussel’s original design, which means 21332 The Globe measures 26cm wide and 40cm tall. That’s just one centimetre higher than the concept model.

It’s pretty reasonably priced

Given the hefty size and piece count of 21332 The Globe, you might be expecting a price tag north of £200 / $200 / €200 for this one. In the US and Europe, it toes that line at $199.99 / €199.99, while in the UK, it actually comes in at just £174.99 (provided the LEGO Group’s press release is accurate, which hasn’t always been the case over the last 12 months).

It’s launching next month

You don’t have long to wait to get your hands on 21332 The Globe: it’ll be available to purchase from February 1, 2022 at LEGO.com and in LEGO Stores. It may be available through select third-party retailers later in the year, but if you want it straight away, you’ll have to go through official channels.

We’ve already reviewed it

Click here to check out our verdict on 21332 The Globe.

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