LEGO Architecture Sagrada Familia needs record-breaking scale

Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia is rumoured to be the inspiration behind the future biggest LEGO set ever – and rightly so.

There are many reasons why the Sagrada Familia has not been finished in the more than 140 years it’s been worked on. Some of it is down to a reliance on private donations, some is due to how some of Gaudí’s designs were destroyed during the Spanish Civil War – but a lot of it comes down to just how complex it is.

Antoni Gaudí designed the mammoth church with unique columns that don’t stand straight and complex honeycomb-style geometry tracking throughout the vast structure. Making them a reality relies on complex 3D modelling, precise engineering techniques, and specialised, custom-carved stone blocks for each section.

Not only does that make it a gargantuan task to complete in real life, but it would also be quite the feat when made out of LEGO bricks, as is rumoured. It should perhaps come as no surprise then that the rumoured piece count of 12,060 bricks would make it the largest LEGO set ever.

Looking at the current top 10 biggest LEGO sets, LEGO Architecture, despite recreating some of the biggest structures in the world, doesn’t have any entries on the list. If there is any one Architecture LEGO set to make the list, however, it’s this one.

21061 Notre-Dame de Paris is the largest set in the theme so far, with 4,383 pieces, but even that pales in comparison to 21065 Sagrada Familia’s rumoured 12,060.

The two buildings are both similar in the way of being cathedrals, but even the intricacies of Notre-Dame can’t quite match the unique style of the Sagrada Familia. Looking at close-ups of the building’s real-life exteriors, as pictured side-by-side below, shows just how much more detail the Spanish cathedral has and, perhaps most importantly, how unique each section of it is.

That’s because of Gaudí’s philosophy when designing the Sagrada Familia, wanting to create an artificial structure that mimics the non-linear, organic flow of natural elements. In this case, the Sagrada Familia was meant to mimic a forest.

That lack of symmetry and regular formations means that no two towers are exactly the same. Even within one tower, different rows of the honeycomb structure differ in size and complexity. All that is to say, doing it justice would require a lot of LEGO bricks, making the record-breaking 12,060 pieces it’s rumoured to have far from a surprise.

Of course, we can’t be sure that 21065 Sagrada Familia is on the way until we get official confirmation from the LEGO Group. Take any rumoured information here with a pinch of salt until we do.

Featured image: Manuel Torres Garcia on Pexels, licensed under Public Domain

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