International LEGO® Day – Can you build a LEGO® model inspired by the Dockyard?
Calling all LEGO® builders
Not content with hosting one of the most exciting LEGO® exhibitions in years, the team at The Historic Dockyard Chatham is also putting out a call for LEGO® builders to enter their own Dockyard inspired LEGO® creations for a unique competition, to be judged by LEGO® Masters Australia‘s Ryan “The Brickman” McNaught.
The competition features three age categories – aged 8 and under, 9 to 17 years, and 18 years and over. The winners will have their models displayed at The Historic Dockyard Chatham as part of the Brickwrecks: Sunken Ships in LEGO® Bricks exhibition, and will also receive annual tickets along with some amazing LEGO® gifts.
Paul Barnard, Deputy Chief Executive, Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust, said:
“We are thrilled to bring this internationally renowned exhibition to Chatham in 2025. Brickwrecks brilliantly combines creativity, maritime archaeology, and engineering to bring the stories of eight legendary shipwrecks to life.
“In adding a competition to the spring programme at the Dockyard, we hope that the model entries will add even further to the LEGO®-fever we are all excited about unleashing this spring at The Historic Dockyard Chatham.”
With the longest actual brick built building in Europe, and 400 years of naval history, The Historic Dockyard Chatham is the perfect place to showcase this exciting LEGO® exhibition in the UK, opening on Saturday 8 March 2025.
Created in partnership with the Australian National Maritime Museum and the Western Australian Museum, this exhibition invites visitors of all ages to explore the tales of iconic shipwrecks, brought to life through intricate, large-scale LEGO® models designed by Certified Professional Ryan “The Brickman” McNaught.
170,463 LEGO® bricks and 1,336.5 hours have gone into creating eight wrecks dating from the oldest known shipwreck in around 1300 BCE, to the iconic RMS TITANIC shipwreck of 1912.
Fittingly, in Latin, ‘lego’ means ‘collect’ or ‘assemble’, and there are more than 200 types of LEGO® bricks and more than 60 different colours.
Each of the 11 models in the new LEGO® exhibition at The Historic Dockyard Chatham in Kent have used thousands of individual LEGO® bricks, in differing types, and taken hours of time to craft, based on meticulous research undertaken by Em Blamey and the team at the Australian National Maritime Museum.
LEGO®’s inventor, Ole Kirk Christiansen, created the name ‘LEGO®’ from taking the first two letters of the Danish words leg and godt, meaning ‘play well’.
The team at The Historic Dockyard Chatham hope that in using LEGO® to engage new audiences, giving them time to play, assemble and create in the No.1 Smithery exhibition space, they will be able to share their treasure trove of marine archeology and history at the famous Dockyard where over 400 years of naval history was made.
Brickwrecks: Sunken Ships in LEGO® Bricks will be on display at The Historic Dockyard Chatham from 8 March to 31 August 2025. Tickets, included in the Dockyard admission, are available with discounted prices on the website.
