LEGO 10307 Eiffel Tower’s design is inspired by much smaller sets

The unusually high piece count of 10307 Eiffel Tower is the result of LEGO’s structural limits, with the extra pieces creating a more attractive model than we might have got.

10307 Eiffel Tower is the latest behemoth to grace the LEGO Icons line, offering a massive rendition of the famous Paris landmark. While it has many impressive features, its piece count is certainly one of the most striking. 10,001 elements are used in its construction (one of them is the brick separator, which you’ll want if – like us – you tend to make mistakes on larger sets).

If you’re wondering where all those pieces go, a recent interview with Rok Žgalin Kobe – the set’s designer – sheds some light on things. It turns out that several of these elements can be found in the tower’s upper sections, and help alleviate the natural bending that occurs with larger LEGO pieces. Stacking several long, thin plates here would result in a bendier model – but replacing them with shorter equivalents helps to alleviate the problem.

“It’s not a quality issue, but a physics issue”, Kobe explains. “You can get a bend from the plates because the clutch is pulling them upwards. It’s not so that the brick count would be higher, it’s so that there are more sections which would absorb the forces, which means that these [sections] are nice and straight.”

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This design choice was in turn inspired by Kobe’s work on the LEGO Architecture range – which creates tiny dioramas of famous cities. Since these typically use long, narrow bases as a starting point, Kobe used his experience here to make a better, larger model going forward.

“I have been building base plates for LEGO skylines (which are made out of sandwiched plates) for a while so it’s a fairly known problem to me, but here it was really exaggerated – especially since we’re building on such a scale”, Kobe says. 

Ironically, the set’s piece count was notably lower at the beginning of the design process – but the set’s structural limits naturally changed that, and eventually encouraged the designers to shoot for the 10,000 piece mark. “I estimated a much lower one at the beginning, we weren’t aiming particularly for the 10,000 that we’ve managed to hit. But that was just a nice push at the end when we saw that we were so close”.

10307 Eiffel Tower will be available for purchase at LEGO.com from November 25 for £554.99 / $629.99 / €629.99. If you’re looking for reasons to buy it, our list of five justifications may be what you’re after.

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