10 Fun Things You Didn't Know About LEGO
- Wednesday 18th December 2024
We’ve all got different childhood memories; experiences, people and places. But, there’s one commonality in most of our minds: LEGO®. If you spent hours and hours building with these bricktastic blocks – you’re not alone. Constructing creations and bringing our imagination to life was a national pastime, as was the pain of stepping on random bricks that were left on the floor.
But, there’s more to these bricks than meets the eye. As one of the most popular toys in a host of households, kids and adults alike love LEGO; maybe it’s about time you get to know these little bricks a bit better. Here are 10 fun facts you might not know about LEGO.
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LEGO Company History
Founded by Ole Kirk Christiansen in 1932 in Billund, Denmark. The company has since passed from generation to generation and is to this day still owned by the Kirk Kristiansen family.
These colourful bricks get their internationally recognisable name ‘LEGO’ by appropriating the first two letters of the Danish words LEG GODT, which means ‘play well.’ Working as a carpenter, Christiansen used to make toys from leftover wood; his kids loved them, so he began producing them to sell. By 1949, LEGO blocks still didn’t resemble those of today; the actual interlocking bricks weren’t manufactured until 1959.
Learn more about the history of LEGO at their official website here.
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Flawless Manufacturing & The Universal System of LEGO Bricks
Due to their famous universal system, no matter when the bricks were manufactured, they still fit seamlessly with today’s LEGO. Even DUPLO® bricks connect with regular bricks as they’re precisely twice the size on each length, so 8 times the volume.
For LEGO to become the worldwide success it is, the moulds used to make the bricks have to be flawless. Because there’s no room for error, the bricks are accurate to within a two-thousandth of a millimetre.
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LEGO is the World’s Largest Tyre Manufacturer
If asked to name the world's largest tire manufacturer, you might think of Bridgestone or Michelin, but the correct answer is LEGO. Based on sheer quantity, LEGO's tires, though smaller and less detailed, top the list. These tires are used in various sets, from car-focused Speed Champions to general themes like the City line. In 2011, Guinness World Records awarded LEGO the title, noting that the company produced a remarkable 381 million tires in 2010 alone.
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LEGO: Toy of the Century
It’s no surprise that back in the year 2000, LEGO was hailed as the ‘Toy of the Century’ by the British Association of Toy Retailers. To earn this epic title, the modest LEGO brick had to beat the good old Teddy Bear, as well as Barbie.
For anyone interested, the game of the century was judged to be Monopoly, and the craze of the century winner was the Yo-Yo
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The World's Tallest LEGO Tower
There’s much contention as to which LEGO tower takes the title of the world’s tallest. With LEGO enthusiasts always aiming sky-high, the tower that stretched 34.76 metres into the sky above the Hungarian capital, Budapest, was certified by the Guinness World Records as the world’s tallest.
Watch the world’s tallest LEGO tower being constructed here
Whilst not yet confirmed by Guinness World Records, it appears this record may have been beaten, with a LEGO tower being constructed in Tel Aviv that measured 35.94 metres in height, beating the old record by just shy of a metre
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The Correct Plural of LEGO
It doesn’t matter if you’re talking about a single block, or a pile of one hundred bricks – The plural of LEGO is LEGO, not LEGOs. And speaking of multiple blocks, the largest commercially produced LEGO set is the LEGO® STAR WARS Ultimate Collectors Series Millennium Falcon. -
LEGO Goes to Space
In 2011, LEGO went into space as part of the ‘LEGO Bricks in Space’ program. Astronauts took 13 LEGO sets to the International Space Station so they could find out how the bricks behave in microgravity.
Again in 2023 LEGO went to space…
A high-altitude balloon carried a mini space-shuttle with 1000 Legonauts to the edge of space. Three flights were conducted from an airport in Slovakia.
The balloon burst at an altitude of 21 miles (34 kilometers) and then the landing platform returned to Earth under a parachute.
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Mind-Blowing LEGO Combinations
Mathematician Søren Eilers was intrigued by a LEGO-related maths problem. Let's say you have six "standard LEGO bricks" (the rectangular 4x2 bricks seen in the original LEGO patent). If you fit them together, how many possible structures can you make?
This question was first officially "answered" in 1974, and LEGO mathematicians arrived at the number 102,981,500. Eilers was curious about the mathematical methodology behind that number, and soon discovered that it only covered one kind of stacking—thus, it was dramatically low. So he wrote a computer program that modelled all the possible brick combinations. After running the program for a week, he ended up with a massive number: 915,103,765 combinations.
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The Popularity and Abundance of LEGO
If LEGO Minifigures were people, they’d be the world's largest population! Over four billion of them have been created since 1978. And because LEGO is much-loved around the world, incredibly, there are, on average 80 LEGO® bricks for every single person on our planet! That’s a whole lotta blocks!
Speaking of minifigures…
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Every LEGO Minifigure Had the Exact Same Head Shape for 21 Years
Today, many minifigures boast incredible detailing, from dual-molded legs and arm printing to cloth accessories, showing how much LEGO has raised the bar in recent years. However, it wasn't until 1999—21 years after the first minifigure was created—that LEGO introduced sculpted head pieces for its minifigures. Before then, every LEGO figure had the same head shape, limiting the variety of characters that could be accurately depicted.
Bonus Minifigure facts:
There have been over 4 billion LEGO Minifigures produced since 1978
Kyle Ugone has a Guinness World Record for having the most LEGO Minifigures with 9,079
For such little blocks, they’ve got a big history and a huge reach. And with all the new toy trends that come and go, LEGO has stood the test of time; continuing to earn diehard fans all over the world.
Visit LEGOLAND® Discovery Centre Melbourne today!
