I’ve never read the Twilight books nor have I watched the films based on them. However, I am greatly aware of the impact both have had and the fanbase they collected. The first film in the Twilight Saga was released in 2008 and closely follows the story of Stephanie Meyer’s books. I must admit I’m surprised the fan-designed set was chosen to become a LEGO® Ideas set. Although the film series has garnered a rabid fanbase, the last film was released almost 15 years ago. But judging by the popularity of the sets revealed last month, you can’t keep a good sparkly vampire down. Here’s a closer look at the newly released LEGO Ideas The Cullen House set.
Product Details
Set Name: The Cullen House | Set Number: 21354 | Pieces: 2001 | Theme: Ideas
Number of Bags: Bags x 18 | Instructions: Paper booklet + Builder App | Stickers: Sheet x 1 | Minifigures: Bella Swan, Edward Cullen, Jacob Black, Carlisle Cullen, Alice Cullen, Charlie Swan & Rosalie Hale | Insiders QR: Yes
RRP: £189.99/$219.99/219.99€/349.99AUD/279.99CAD
Availability: LEGO Stores & LEGO Online
The story of Twilight follows Bella Swan, a sullen human who becomes involved with an equally sudden family of vampires. Between the moody stares, the Cullen siblings, who are vampires, must keep their otherworldly condition secret whilst also going to college. Soon Bella and Edward Cullen’s paths cross and after saving her life on more than one occasion, the pair falls in love. The Cullen’s are best described as hipster vampires and live in a modern house in the woods, which is the inspiration for this set. The house is a real property located in Portland and featured in the first film. The interior was replicated for the sequel. Learn more about the real ‘Twilight’ house here.
The original fan-designed project was chosen to become a future LEGO Ideas set in December 2023. Created by Nick Micheels, the original project included the house, a wolf and four characters. As you can see from the original design, the set includes elements of Nick’s design but it has been tweaked and expanded in places.
Before starting on the house, the build begins with the vintage red pickup truck driven by Bella. Gifted to her by her Dad, the truck is featured several times during Twilight. In the film, the truck is 1960’s Chevy. The straight angles of the truck have been captured in the build. Similar to other sets of this type, the vehicle is 6 studs wide and is merely to compliment the wider set. It could have easily been omitted from the set with little negative impact. Unless it has some greater significance to the films I’m unaware of it.
Vampire residences are normally creeping old properties but the Cullen’s is an architectural marvel with has resulted in an interesting LEGO build. The house has three floors, each built separately and connected on top of each other giving easy access to the set’s interior. The base section is the biggest, with a little bit of forest featured around the base of the building. Most of the outdoor border of the property is built as you tackle the base, but the trees are added towards the end of the build. Inside you’ll find plenty of little details including a grand piano, extensive bookshelf and an angular entrance.
The second floor spans the same footprint as the base, although some of it is a small balcony section on both the side and rear of the house. The unique architecture of the middle section has a pair of beams framing the large section of windows on the left of the house. I did find these would easily become dislodged. The interior of the middle section is where you’ll find the kitchen and living room. You’ll also notice a feature Easter Eggs connected to the wider Twilight Saga such as the extremely odd baseball game. I do like how all these little details have been built into the set. Learn more about some of the set’s other Easter Eggs here.
The upper section of the house is the smallest and like the base section it’s also a different colour making than middle section below, stand out even more. Inside is filled with detail including an extremely small bathroom and another lounge area. This section continues with the Easter Eggs, mostly implemented through stickered sections. The upper section nearly sits on top of the rest of the house and is topped by two wall-like sections which become the roof of the house. These are physically connected to the house, through clutch power, instead, they sit within the gap of the room and are held in place with the lights built into the underside of the ceiling plates.
The result is a unique-looking LEGO building. The modern design of the real building is nicely suited to being replicated with LEGO bricks. It still requires some interesting techniques to perfectly recreate some of the unusual angles of the building. This is especially the case around the doorway of the house. Although not as spacious as the real house, the use of walls to incorporate some of the interior detail works really well, as does the assumed garage door merely being a wall in the set. This preserves the exterior appearance of the house without having an unnecessary space inside.
The set features several characters from the films including Bella Swan, Edward Cullen and a few of his blood-loving chums. Plus Bella Police Officer Dad and werewolf Jacob. They are pretty generic characters, even Charlie Swan is featured without his police uniform. All of the vampires have alternate faces with their golden glazed eyes being the only clue to their otherworldly affliction. The stand-out character has to be Edward, who also features the iconic sparkles.
Jacob has the most appearance options, with his minifigure featuring both long and short hair. He’s also included in his wolf form. The werewolf version is a brick-built character. The set could have easily used the wolf figure introduced in the latest series of LEGO Minifigures, but the brick-built animal results in a bigger creature, which is better suited to the source material.
It’s an odd film series to base a set on. Although the story and characters of the Twilight Saga are well-known, the designer house doesn’t necessarily scream vampires or Twilight. Fans of the films will recognise areas from the house but even then it’s merely a modern-looking home. Separating it from the Twilight films, the set provides an interesting build. It has some fun techniques to capture the building’s unique features. The set will have a fanbase but I think it may follow in the footsteps of similar sets such as Seinfeld, The Office, BTS and Queer Eye. These are brands which have quite a niche appeal. Regardless of your interest in the Twilight films, the resulting set is quite cool in appearance both inside and out. The LEGO Ideas Twilight The Cullen House set is available now.
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The LEGO Group provided this set to BricksFanz for this review. However, the thoughts expressed in this review are those of BricksFanz and do not reflect those of the LEGO Group. Providing a set for free does not guarantee a favourable opinion of the set.