Life-sized VW camper van made entirely of LEGO was built out of 400,000 bricks

The iconic LEGO blocks we know and love rose from carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen’s second workshop in Billund, destroyed by fire in 1942 during the German occupation of Denmark. Being no stranger to disasters and hardship having lost his first workshop and family home to fire in 1924, Christiansen was not prepared to give up and built a bigger workshop. The 1929 world depression took its toll on the business, he lost his wife in 1932 and he had to lay off most of his staff since there were no customers with money to spend on furniture.

Not one to sit idly, Christiansen decided to use the wood he had left to create inexpensive goods, including toys. He was forced into bankruptcy when his plan failed but he continued working, focusing on making toys. Through all the difficulty over the years, the carpenter realized he had found his gift and continued making toys, in spite of going into bankruptcy. His high quality prototypes of cars, animals and pull toys became sought after in Denmark which prompted him to rename the company ‘leg godt’ (play well), which became LEGO.

The sales from his toys put the business in a better position which helped him overcome the 1942 fire which destroyed his workshop and post war shortages of materials for manufacturing products, forcing the toymaker, and many other manufacturers, to look at advances in plastics. The long and difficult road ultimately led Christiansen to the self-locking plastic brick, invented by Kiddicraft, a British company. LEGO started manufacturing the bricks in 1949. and in 1981 they officially bought the rights of the bricks from Kiddicraft.

Since then, several generations of children’s creativity were unleashed by the little bricks and many LEGO fans have gone beyond the playroom with their creations. And then there’s Lego Master Builders, and only a handful are certified Lego Master Builders… Yes, it’s a real job building LEGO, hired by the company to build all those large-scale LEGO sculptures seen at their Discovery centers, LEGOLAND theme parks, LEGO retail stores and at other events they help organize.

In January 2019 certified LEGO Master Builder Rene Hoffmeister and colleague Pascal Lenhard received the ambitious world record attempt to build the iconic VW T2 camper, including a foldable roof in the real size using LEGO bricks. Of course, the planning of such large scale projects happens in advance with the aid of 3D programs. From the completed building plan they could calculate the exact number and type of bricks needed for the T2 camper – 400,000 pieces in this instance. Every aspect of the build must be accurately determined such as the side walls and windows to ensure the LEGO T2 camper has long-term stability.

The two-man team went all out on this project, adding the distinctive Westfalia folding roof, the sliding door and the nostalgic interior of the 60s, made from LEGO bricks, completing the project in six weeks.

 The completed T2 is over 16ft (5m) long, 6ft (1.9m) wide and over 6ft (2m) high without the folding roof open, weighing in at around 1,550lb (700kg).