LEGO designer Hoang Huy Dang pitched a passion project for a whole new type of LEGO set that brought with it its own set of design rules.
Speaking to LEGO Fan Media for the reveal of LEGO Icons 10362 French Cafe, LEGO designer Hoang Huy Dang explained how he pitched the concept that became 10362 French Café has a personal passion project of his, with high hopes that, eventually, LEGO fans and newcomers to building LEGO would see the same potential in it.
"I have a deep passion for adult products and I wanted to branch out even more to attract different audiences," Hoang said. "10362 French Café is something new, something you don't really expect it. My hope is that it could have a substantial place in the product line."
Of course, starting a whole new series and a brand-new type of LEGO set comes with its own challenges. While collections like modular buildings or sub-themes like the LEGO Star Wars Helmet Collection already have a design playbook established, 10362 French Café is starting from scratch.
"It was a big challenge because there's nothing to base it on," Hoang noted. "It's not an IP so there's no guidelines of what to do. It's a blank piece of paper for me and for my team members to tackle. It's really fun but, at the same time, if you have too much freedom, that can cause challenges as well.
"The biggest challenge was to finalise the scale. I started with a big [version of the set], much, much bigger than the final product. We scaled it down and kept all the details.
"One thing that we wanted to make sure is that, when we scale it down, we still have all the nice features that the big one has. Through all the work that we've done, we know that too big of a model might be a challenge for the consumer, so that's why we ended up with a condensed version."
The size was one aspect that Hoang says is now solidified for any potential future sets in the Restaurants of the World series – although it's not guaranteed that we'll see more. The branding on the box certainly suggests that it could be a sub-theme but, presumably, that will depend on the success of 10362 French Café.
"This product gives an idea of the format that we are looking into," Hoang explained. "They're going to sit on the base and they're going to be buildings of some sort. [Any future sets] are going to have similar features but they'll be different from one another, of course – but that's only if we decided to return to this in the future."
While 10362 French Café has some similar features to the Modular Buildings Collection, it doesn't have any connectors that would allow future sets to connect to one another.
"The idea is that you have a display piece and it can work on the shelf," Hoang said. "It doesn't need to be in a city layout, or next to another building to make sense. In the future, if any more products come out, they would stand next to each other but that's why we decided not to include the connector, the technical connector, as you might see in a modular building. It can be a nice standalone display for your home."
Ultimately, while 10362 French Café appears to have cemented design rules around size and level of the detail, the future of the Restaurants of the World collection truly depends on LEGO fans. Hoang said he and the LEGO design team are open to feedback and suggestions on 10362 French Café and any possible companions.
"We would love to get feedback on 10362 French Café," Hoang said with a smile. "Being the first, it's always a challenge and we will probably get a lot more input throughout the lifetime of this product. We hope to keep the size but we'll see what the future brings."
Take a closer look at the new LEGO Icons set in our initial reveal with 10362 French Café available to buy from March 1 for £69.99 in the UK, $79.99 in the US and €79.99 in Europe.
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