Although the new LEGO® Friends sets are focused on the adventures of a new gang of characters, the theme hasn’t forgotten its roots. The original Friends are still out and about in Heartlake City and they appear to be doing well for themselves. After Mia made an appearance with her daughter Autumn in one of the first of the rebooted sets, all of the original characters are back in this new set. It’s also a set which boasts many firsts for LEGO Friends, as it features the most characters, sports the highest piece count for a Friends set and is the first to carry a 14+ age rating. Here’s a closer look at the impressive Modern Mansion.
Product Details
Set Name: Andrea’s Modern Mansion | Set Number: 42639 | Pieces: 2275 | Theme: Friends
RRP: £169.99/$84.99/84.99€ | Number of Bags: Bags x 17 + loose elements| Instructions: Paper booklet + Builder App | Stickers: Sheet x 1 | Characters: Stephanie, Olivia, Emma, Andrea, Mia, Paisley, Leo, Autumn, Ji-Won & Imani | Insiders QR: Yes
Availability: LEGO Stores, LEGO Online & General Retail
The Friends sets may not command the attention of many older LEGO fans, but the reboot has seen the long-running theme turn a few heads. One of the latest sets to do so is the Modern Mansion, which is home to the original Friends character Andrea.
It’s not just a swanky mansion which Andrea’s musical career has allowed her to own, she also has a rather impressive car. Andrea’s wheels could give the detailed Speed Champions cars a run for their money. The sports car is very impressive, which is genuinely a surprise. Vehicles included in larger sets are often merely a supplementary build, merely included to add another play function. That’s partly the case here, yes it’s not the focus of the set but effort has been made to create a great-looking car. I particularly like that it still has the aesthetic of the Friends world.
The inclusion of the car also influences a neat play feature of the set. The first section of the mansion you build is a garage. This isn’t merely a space to store the car, it has a great working function. The base of the garage is a sloping floor, which is part of a mechanism also connected to the garage door. A handle on the side of the building can be turned which first opens the garage door before it activates the slopes floor and propels the car out.
The mansion’s exterior is spectacular and is added at different stages throughout the building of the set. The first of the outside details is a small rocky garden near the stepped entrance of the mansion. This snakes around a pool, the use of ‘water’ is an easy way to denote a homeowner is doing well for themselves. So along with this pool at the front of the building, there’s a hot tube on the right section of the building and there’s even a small waterfall cascading from the rooftop garden into a smaller garden below.
As you can see from the images, the building has a unique angled layout. Unlike other sets, the overall layout of the building is solid and stable. Often when a building is not straight, the joining of two sections to craft the angled shape can be partly unstable. That’s certainly not the case here. The cladding also helps with this as well as giving the set a splash of colour. This can be found around the framing of the upper windows, where a series of different shades of tiles. Over the windows are similar coloured transparent garage shutter panels.
The interior is nicely detailed but is a little cramped. Despite the small rooms, the inside area of the mansion has a trio of rooms including a living area and a recording studio on the ground floor. Along with a couple of bedrooms and a small bathroom on the upper floor. As a swanky mansion, there’s also living space included on the roof and as mentioned above, in outside areas. The interior of the mansion also features a central core, which houses a lift. This uses the newish worm gear and platform, which can then be rotated to make the lift move between floors. The lift isn’t the easiest thing to get to once the rest of the mansion is built around it, but it’s another nice play feature to have.
One thing I like about the interior is the small nods to Andrea’s music career. These include a recording studio, with a hidden guest bed, awards and a piano. She may have may the big time, but Andrea still remembers her roots and has a whole wall of photos on the landing area between the upper floor rooms.
This is one of the very few sets to feature all five of the original Friends characters. They are all grown up now but still the best of friends. Andrea’s love of music has seen her become a famous musician and owner of this mansion. She’s joined by fellow familiar faces Emma, Mia, Stephanie and Olivia. Despite being the same mini-dolls as other teenage/adult characters in the theme, their appearance does show they have become older. It’s nice to see the past 10-plus years of LEGO Friends is still part of the rebooted theme.
Along with the original characters, the set features a couple of newer faces, along with a couple of all-new characters. Paisley and Leo join Mia’s daughter Autumn. These versions of the characters have been featured in past sets. Finally, Ji-Won appears to be Andrea’s partner and they have a daughter, Imani, who is a micro-doll. The product description states the set features 11 characters but there are only 10, I certainly wouldn’t include Imani’s toy rabbit or the bird figures as characters.
It’s nice to see LEGO Friends sets continue to try new things. It may not be a Friends modular but the build experience isn’t far off. I especially love the exterior, it certainly manages to portray the celebrity lifestyle Andrea must now lead. But I think the thing I enjoy the most about the set is that blends the new direction for LEGO Friends whilst remembering where the theme began. Andrea’s Modern Mansion is available now and if you purchase the before January 14th you’ll get two first LEGO Friends polybag sets.
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The LEGO Group provided this set for review purposes. The thoughts within this review are those of BricksFanz.com and do not reflect those of the LEGO Group. Providing the set for free does not guarantee a favourable opinion of the set.
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