The designer behind two LEGO NINJAGO 2026 anniversary sets says their development timeline was ‘the most intense process I’ve ever been in’, pulling off both builds within an extremely tight window.
Lee Chi Wing is the mastermind behind both 71861 The Old Town and 71858 Four Weapons Blacksmith, two of 2026’s most highly-anticipated 15th anniversary NINJAGO sets, and which come in at 4,851 and 1,259 pieces respectively. You might imagine that the development process for bigger and more complex sets would be longer than usual, especially when tackling two at once… but no.
According to Lee, the timeline for designing a particular assortment is the same regardless of the sets involved. “You may think a bigger model would have more time, but the truth is that we don’t, because all the production timeline runs at the same time,” he told Bricks By Mind. “We always have the same amount of time allocated to developing the first half of the year products.”
“So I basically spent the [same] amount of time developing
If it feels like Lee had a lot on his plate for the first half of 2026, it was entirely his decision. He designed the sketch models for 71861 The Old Town, so when it came time to assign specific sets to designers in the NINJAGO team, he obviously put himself forward for the flagship 15th anniversary set. But when his Design Lead asked if he’d like to work on a second project at the same time, there was only one contender.
“I spent two months mentally preparing myself to accept the fate that I would not be able to work on the Blacksmith, because I know I’m going to take on [Old Town],” Lee continued. “I was like, ‘There’s no way they will let me work on this and the Blacksmith.’ As a LEGO designer, we always work in teams, and we always pass our models around. It doesn’t really matter if it’s me who worked on a certain model as long as the product ends up great.
“But as a NINJAGO fan, there’s something special about the Blacksmith shop. It’s the set. I would really hate to miss the chance to design that and work on it… so I thought, it probably doesn’t harm to ask, right? [I said] ‘I would really love to do the Blacksmith but I know it’s probably not realistic.’ And he said to me, ‘No, actually, that’s the two models I hoped you would want to work on.’”
Lee didn’t put a specific number on the amount of development time for both 71861 The Old Town and 71858 Four Weapons Blacksmith, but he did reveal that each sketch model for the larger set took around a month to complete, compared to his usual timeline of a few sketch models per week for a mech (for example).
This might be starting to sound a little like the crunch problem that plagues the video game industry, in which developers work punishingly long hours to finish a project on time – yet Lee said he has no regrets with how everything went down.
“That whole process was very, very intense,” he added. “It’s probably the most intense design process I’ve ever been in… I still think it was surreal to see both of the products turn out alright. But if I could go back in time, I wouldn’t say no to the opportunity to work on the Blacksmith.”
We’ve already gone hands-on with both 71861 The Old Town and 71858 Four Weapons Blacksmith, which you can check out by hitting the links below. Both sets debut January 1 at LEGO.com and in LEGO Stores as part of the wider LEGO NINJAGO 15th anniversary range.
For more on 71861 The Old Town, head here to find out why the team decided not to turn it into another NINJAGO City module, or head over to Bricks By Mind’s YouTube channel for the full, two-hour-long interview with Lee Chi Wing.
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