When the #71016 LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart was first announced, it wasn’t just Simpsons fans who got excited. This is the first time LEGO fans got a proper convenience store in any LEGO theme. The realistically detailed exterior and fully stocked interior makes this a perfect corner store that would fit in most LEGO city settings. 🙂
And of course the #71016 LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart is also an excellent match to the LEGO Modular Building series, because it is a proper four-sided building, scaled just right for minifigures. The structure would have to go to a corner though – or the end of the street – as it has a different shape than the other LEGO Modular Buildings. However if you would like to modify the #71016 LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart to match the style and size of the other Modulars, there is one LEGO fan who will give you an excellent example of how to do that.
Flick member cimddwc built a row of three houses for his LEGO city to match the other LEGO Modular Buildings. Two of them are older style, using masonry-bicks in sand-green and dark-orange, and the third building is more modern. The middle building got the Kwik-E-Mart incorporated into its first floor, pretty much exactly as it came in the original set. The rooftop is also from the original Kwik-E-Mart. In between are sandwiched two additional stories; one of which is an extended version of the #21302 LEGO Ideas The Big Bang Theory set with an added kitchen, and the other floor includes three bedrooms and a bathroom loosely inspired by other settings in The Big Bang Theory TV show.
The whole arrangement comes together perfectly. This is an excellent example of repurposing not just one, but two official LEGO sets to create something different. Getting one or more great LEGO sets and merging them together takes off a lot of pressure from the builder to design every single detail,as LEGO’s own designers have already done it for them. Official LEGO sets also provide substantial amount of LEGO elements to start with – which is usually the most economic way of working on larger projects.
Of course there are still things for the builder to do. For example in the case of this building, while the original LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart had both an interior and an exterior, the LEGO Ideas The Big Bang Theory focuses only on the living room itself, so the exterior walls on the second and third floors had to be custom designed. The masonry-bricks help with this greatly as they provide quite a bit of texture and realism. The colors were inspired by walls of The Big Bang Theory set. So all was left to do was designing the window-frames and extra decorations to match the style of other LEGO Modular Buildings – which was done very tastefully here.
While the focus of this article is to show you how the LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart could be incorporated into a LEGO Modular Building setting, I wanted to briefly mention the other two structures. The sand-green corner building also uses an official LEGO set for its first floor: the #41074 LEGO Elves Azari and the Magical Bakery set. And there is also a super-secret worship room for the cult members of FOOLOO a.k.a. Followers of the One Long Orange Object – reminds me of The LEGO Movie scene! The other two floors include a ballet school using the new ballerina from LEGO Minifigures Series 15.
The modern house on the right got an antiques store in the basement and first floor, and an apartment on the second and third floors, with the bedroom all the way at the top for a great view. While the style of this building is different, it perfectly blends in with the rest of the street – very much like modern buildings are often seen next to older structures in real life. If you would like to see more pictures, check out cimddwc’s flickr album.
If you have ever considered adding the LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart to your LEGO Modular Buildings, I hope this example gives you some ideas and inspiration. As you can see, with some ingenuity, and with the help of a few official LEGO sets, you can build impressive structures that fit the LEGO Modular Building style. The sets mentioned in this article can be found at the Online LEGO Shop at the following links: #71016 LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart, #21302 LEGO Ideas The Big Bang Theory, #41074 LEGO Elves Azari and the Magical Bakery, LEGO Modular Buildings.
So what do you think? How do you like this modified version of the LEGO The Simpsons Kwik-E-Mart? And what do you think of the other buildings? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section below! 😉
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This is fantastic! Really like the Kwik-E-Mart mod and the other buildings are great too. My favorite picture is the one when you look down the street. Looks so real!
Yeah, I like that picture a lot too. 🙂
This is really good and it gives me some ideas of what to do with my Kwik E Mart! My wife hates that I have the Kwik E Mart and constantly complains how it doesn’t go with our current Lego Village of Lego Modular buildings. She doesn’t like its size, color, and style. Taking the Kwik E Mart pieces and the TBBT pieces to create a modular of the two could work!
And while she likes what the Ghostbusters HQ has to offer and the details it has, she has started to complain that in proportion to the rest of the village, it is huge. And to top it off, I still haven’t finished building it. I’m about halfway through it and have logged shy of 9 hours into it.
On that note of the Ghostbusters HQ, my only complaint so far is the floors (the second and third floors, not the baseplate). I can’t quite seem to figure out how to keep them from warping and to sit flush. I work on a hard flat surface and I understand that as you stack more and more bricks on one side of a plate than the other, it’s going to want to curve a little due to how the bricks “snap” into place. Usually an even distribution of bricks help balance it out, but since the building opens like a doll house on one side, there isn’t anywhere near the amount of bricks and supports to balance out the warping. To help minimize this, I have added a few extra 2×6 plates under the floor to give it extra support and to add some “negative” warping to the plates. Secondly, between build sessions I use some 2×2 plates on the top of the floor at the seams to help “train” the floor to sit flat. Maybe once the build is complete the weight and extra supports will help balance it out too. I wonder what others do when they run into s similar situation.
You may want to show your wife the pictures and she what she thinks. She might like the modular version of the Kwik-E-Mart better. I personally thing it is super nice! As far as the warping of the HQ, funny thing is that I was just reading a discussion about this yesterday. And yes, the floors warp and a lot of people have issues with this. Besides the solutions you already mentioned, another thing you could do is to add ledges to the opening wings, so when the set is closed, the floors have somewhere to rest.
Just wonderful!
This can’t be canon!…
LOL! Why? 🙄
This is amazing! It looks like this guy has an entire LEGO custom city! I love the brick-separator worshiping room, that is creative and funny. Also what do you think so far? https://youtu.be/_tCM-xLmfLM
Nicely done. Is that some kind of a LEGO event you have it displayed?
It is a LEGO contest. I dropped it off yesterday, but the main drop off is today so that is why there aren’t very many creations at that time. I go tomorrow to view everybody’s and vote on which creation from each age range is the best, it is pretty clear who I will vote for in my category. lol
Awesome! Good luck in the contest! 😀
Today was the voting and main public viewing day and I was interviewed by News Channel X and I just saw it as it aired. Would it be ok to include that in part of my post about my tower when I am done? Also the new caster actually interviewed multiple people, but mine was the only one that aired.
Thanks, would it be ok to include that video in my post too?
Nice! Congratulations! And yes, sure, it can be included in your post. 🙂