"The challenge with Enterprise was that we had to do the cone on the back," Diment said. Diment earlier built similar models of Discovery and Endeavour for private collectors. The LEGO Enterprise is the not the first space shuttle to be created out of the toy bricks. According to the Intrepid, the two LEGO creations will then be placed into storage at the museum while officials decide the best way to display them. The 550-pound (249 kilograms) LEGO model of the Intrepid was displayed on the World War II ship-turned-museum in 2011.ĭiment's shuttle Enterprise and the mosaic mural will be on public view through Sunday (July 28). A professional LEGO builder whose portfolio includes brick replicas of London's Olympic Stadium (with 10,000 LEGO minifigure spectators) and a 9-foot-tall (2.7 meters) Osprey "Audrey" women's handbag, Diment previously built a 22-foot-long (6.7 m), 250,000 brick model of the USS Intrepid aircraft carrier. This is not Diment's first collaboration with the Intrepid. "It breaks down into 784 squares and each person builds his own square following a pattern and using one-by-one bricks of various different colors," he described. Visitors to the Intrepid are invited to help Diment build the mosaic using 52,914 LEGO pieces. The image, which was taken in 2011, shows Enterprise, flying atop NASA's 747 carrier aircraft, as it soared over Central Park. In addition to building the Enterprise model, Diment is also overseeing the public’s assembly of a mural-sized mosaic this weekend, using thousands of LEGO bricks to recreate a photo of the space shuttle. Although Enterprise never flew in space, it was the only shuttle in history to tour Europe, stopping in France, Germany, Italy and the U.K. In 1983, NASA flew the full-size Enterprise to the Paris Air Show atop the same modified Boeing 747 jumbo jet that it used to perform the orbiter's atmospheric approach and landing tests in 1977. "We had to remove the tail because it sticks up a bit too much." "It pretty much shipped in one piece," he said. Diment constructed the model, brick by brick, at his home in Portsmouth, England and then shipped it to New York. Like the real Enterprise, the LEGO space shuttle made a trans-Atlantic crossing before becoming a museum piece. The Enterprise exhibit had been closed for eight months due to damage suffered from Hurricane Sandy. The public celebration featuring NASA exhibits and astronaut appearances follows the reopening of the Intrepid's "Space Shuttle Pavilion" earlier this month. The 3.5-foot-long (1.2-meter) replica of the black-and-white test orbiter debuted as part of the Intrepid's second annual SpaceFest, now underway in Manhattan. "It was a question of working out each shape - the nose, the wings and so on - and figuring out how you make those out of existing, normal, regular LEGO bricks anyone can buy in the shop," Diment explained.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |