Late last year, the LEGO Group have announced a collaboration between LEGO® Ideas and BrickLink where they’ll be giving past 10K designs from LEGO Ideas, a second chance of being a set via the BrickLink Designer Program. This is similar to the 60th Anniversary AFOL Designer Program. With so many fan designs hitting 10K, it’s inevitable that not all of them can be turned into retail sets. The BrickLink Designer Program will see over 30 original projects invited to take part. Fans will then be able to pre-order the projects, with the first 13 to reach their goal, moving into production. The set will only be able via the BrickLink Designer Program and will not be sold like normal LEGO Ideas sets. Learn more below.
KICKING OFF THE BRICKLINK DESIGNER PROGRAM: 2021 INVITATIONAL
Today we’re excited to share the next steps in the collaboration between LEGO Ideas and BrickLink via the BrickLink Designer Program: 2021 Invitational.
As communicated in December 2020, we planned to invite a selection of LEGO Ideas members and their 10K Club submissions to participate in the pilot program, the purpose being to realize more of the amazing fan designs that are submitted to LEGO Ideas.
The result has been that 27 members have agreed to participate with 31 10K Club projects. We’re thrilled at the response we got from the invited members with almost 100% of the invited members deciding to accept our invitation.
The designers are already very busy at work on their designs in the “pre-production” phase. In this phase, designers must re-work their designs to fit a few program requirements, such as having to build their creations digitally in BrickLink Studio using a particular palette of LEGO bricks and colours, resizing their designs to fit between 400-4000 elements and more.
“This is very cool: I am in control of designing the final product” – Stephan Niks, Creator of Anatomini
The pre-production phase, which ends May 31st. will also include testing phases. Submissions must pass the pre-production phase and deadline in order to have their design(s) eligible for crowdfunding.
On the landing page, you can find the overall timeline for the program as well as an in-depth FAQ that can hopefully assist you with answers to your questions. The BrickLink team will also be available to answer your questions.
HEAD OVER TO BRICKLINK TO START FOLLOWING YOUR FAVOURITE DESIGNS
WHY WERE SO MANY OTHER 10K CREATORS NOT INVITED TO PARTICIPATE IN THE BDP 2021 INVITATIONAL?
Considering the maximum number of sets we can produce, only 32 projects were selected among all the unrealized LEGO Ideas projects. No IP-based models are invited to the program as they cannot be produced through this program.
WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO DESIGNS THAT DON’T MEET THE PROGRAM CRITERIA DURING THE PRE-PRODUCTION PHASE?
Designers of all the participating projects have to revise their original design to meet the program requirements and pass the test building before May 31st. Only the projects that meet the production requirements will be listed for crowdfunding.
HOW MANY DESIGNS WILL BECOME BRICKLINK DESIGNER PROGRAM SETS?
Only the first 13 projects to reach the crowdfunding goal will become BrickLink Designer Program sets.
WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THE DESIGNS THAT DON’T REACH THE CROWDFUNDING GOAL OR ARE NOT AMONG THE 13 QUICKEST TO HIT THEIR GOAL?
The remaining projects in the crowdfunding phase that don’t become BrickLink Designer Program sets will be sold as digital Building Instructions only, so that you can still have an opportunity to find your own bricks to build them.
HOW ARE FAN CREATORS COMPENSATED FOR THEIR IDEAS?
Fan designers will receive a 10% royalty fee for BrickLink Designer Program sets, while designers of Digital Building Instructions will receive a 75% royalty fee.
WHEN WILL I BE ABLE TO BACK (PRE-ORDER) PARTICULAR SETS?
The BrickLink Designer sets will be manufactured from September of 2021 and we aim to ship the first batch in November. We will be able to share more realistic shipping schedule when the manufacturing process begins.
WILL YOU MODIFY THE ORIGINAL LEGO IDEAS DESIGN DURING PRODUCTION?
In the BrickLink Designer Program, we do not intend to change the original designs that are loved by the fans, but there can be inevitable modifications due to production requirements, such as part availability and stability issues. All design revisions will be done by the original designer, and the revision history will be shared on the project’s details page.
