Brickfair

September 11, 2018

Brickfair

"Oculus" by Allen T. Hickman

Every year, what is considered to be the largest Lego convention in the United States happens at BrickFair Chantilly VA, just outside of Washington DC. My son has long been a Lego fanatic, so we naturally had to check it out!

Our feelings about BrickFair were mixed from the start. We were really looking forward to it, and thought if we arrived a little before they opened, that would be best. Not so much. A half hour before opening, and already the only parking spots at the convention center were nearly to Siberia. BrickFair offered online advance tickets, which was supposed to speed things up and enable advance ticket holders to "skip the line". Instead, the overwhelming number of visitors seemed to have purchased advance tickets, and the line was already wrapped literally 3/4 of the way around the entire convention center! But visitors without advance tickets could simply just walk right up, buy tickets and enter. So that didn't work out so well.

Advance ticket holders were also supposed to receive a free perk, a "custom printed brick", which I imagined would be a BrickFair souvenir. Instead it turned out to be a small, flat tile with a "no u-turn" symbol. That seemed quite random. So all in all, advance tickets didn't work out.

Within the exhibit hall, the "theme" areas weren't well defined. My guess is that although they tell exhibitors that their creations will be exhibited with others in the same theme ("space", "castles", etc.), there are many different Lego User Groups that must have wanted to exhibit together, even if they all built in different themes. BrickFair also was different from other Lego conventions we've attended because they do not have a minimum age for exhibitors, which has both big advantages and big disadvantages. It's got to be encouraging for young kids to see the amazing things their peers are creating. But most artists don't create their best work when they are young kids, so overall it just made the exhibit more uneven. There seemed to be less of an atmosphere of competition to impress and outdo everyone else working in a given theme, and there were fewer show-stopping large-scale works than we expected.

However, there were gems to be found throughout the halls. Lego conventions are always a lot of fun. BrickFair allowed exhibitors to add a few lines to the title cards to describe their creations, so many had a story or poem on them, which made them intriguing to read. It's a thoroughly unpretentious, accessible medium for artwork which can occasionally rise to the level of greatness. It's humorous and sly and sometimes brilliant. You definitely don't have to build with Lego yourself to be engaged.