The LEGO Chinese New Year sets of the last couple of years have been beautifully designed and super popular. A few days ago, LEGO announced that there will be releasing several more sets related to Chinese culture early next year. Below are the details.
November 6th, 2020: Today, the LEGO Group revealed four new LEGO sets celebrating classic Chinese culture and legends at the 3rd China International Import Exhibition (CIIE). This is the company’s largest scale of novelty unveils at the CIIE since 2018. The new offerings range from within themes such as LEGO DUPLO, the popular LEGO Chinese Traditional Festival, and the newly-launched LEGO Monkie Kid.
LEGO DUPLO Town Happy Childhood Moments taps into two critical moments of a toddlers’ life in China: Chinese New Year and kindergarten. It can support Chinese parents to teach their preschoolers about traditions of the lunar New Year and key skills to prepare kindergarten life in a playful way. It is also the first LEGO DUPLO set that is customized for Chinese pre-school families.
LEGO Story of Nian invites children to learn the old story about Nian and celebrates the Chinese new year with LEGO bricks. It features a brick-built Chinese residence with traditional decorations, a snowy scene that is brought to life with a poseable Nian creature, a snowman figure, and six minifigures including grandpa, grandma, three children, and a person in an ox costume to mark the Year of the Ox in 2021.
LEGO Spring Lantern Festival recreates the magical atmosphere of the festival that marks the end of the lunar new year celebrations. It features a brick-built Chinese garden with moon gates, pavilion, pond, and bridge, a special ox lantern illuminated by a LEGO light brick, as well as other must-have items during the festival like a rabbit lantern and a Tang Yuan rice ball.
To inspire children to learn more about Chinese traditions when building, illustrations are telling the legendary stories of Nian. The Lantern Festival is added on the building instructions of the two sets, which is the first time this kind of feature appears in the LEGO Chinese Traditional Festival theme.
LEGO Monkie Kids’ Team Quadcopter, is a new set from the LEGO Monkie Kid theme. It presents the story of Monkie Kid’s team of heroes and their battle with Spider Queen, and perfectly combines the modern hi-tech fantasy elements with the well-known Chinese story. The LEGO Monkie Kid theme was launched in May 2020 as the first LEGO theme inspired by a classic Chinese legend. The new set joins the range of 11 sets, which have already been released, to empower children to be brave, resilient, and optimistic through creative play.
The #80106 LEGO Story of Nian and #80107 LEGO Spring Lantern Festival sets will be available in China and Asia Pacific markets from January 1st, 2021, and from January 10th, 2021 at the LEGO seasonal items section of the Online LEGO Shop. and other markets in the world. The #10943 LEGO DUPLO Town Happy Childhood Moments set will be available across LEGO branded retail stores and the LEGO DUPLO section of the Online LEGO Shop globally from January 1st, 2021. The #80023 LEGO Monkie Kids’ Team Quadcopter set will be available from March 1, 2021, together with another six new LEGO Monkie Kid sets. You can check out the currently available sets at the LEGO Monkie Kid section of the Online LEGO Shop.
Paul Huang, Senior Vice President of the LEGO Group and General Manager of LEGO China, said “We are excited and proud of unveiling new products at the CIIE for the third year in a row. All these novelties are rooted firmly in Chinese culture and values, and provide a common ground for children and families to build and play together. By doing this, we can bring the LEGO play experience closer to the hearts of Chinese consumers and support children with learning through play experiences.”
The LEGO group also announced that they will continue to invest in China, which is a strategic growth market for them. Since the 2nd CIIE which was held in November 2019, the number of LEGO branded retail stores on China’s mainland was almost doubled to 207 as of October 31, 2020. It is expected that another 80 new LEGO branded retail stores will be opened on China’s mainland in 2021, making the total number to reach 300 by the end of next year.
Niels B. Christiansen, Chief Executive Officer of the LEGO Group, said “We are very pleased with the progress we have made in China over the past year. We have continued to invest in bringing learning through play to many more children around the country and achieved double-digit growth. Despite the challenges, we opened more than 80 new stores and launched a theme inspired by Chinese legend in the past 12 months. We remain confident in the long-term potential of the China market.”
The LEGO Foundation and the LEGO Group also announced that they have joined forces with China Braille Press, an affiliated agency to China Disabled Persons Federation (CDPF), to test LEGO Braille Bricks in China with objectives of introducing a fun and engaging way to help Chinese children with vision impairment develop tactile skills and learn the Braille system.
The testing program is being implemented in four blind schools in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Taian cities in China. It is the first time that the LEGO Braille bricks toolkit is prototyped outside Latin-based languages. Currently the concept has launched in six Latin-based languages and the ambition is to implement a further five, bringing the total up to eleven languages across twenty countries by early 2021.
Stine Storm, Senior Play & Health Specialist at the LEGO Foundation, said “We are very excited to kick off the testing of LEGO Braille Bricks with local partners in China. We believe blind children should have equal access to learning through play opportunities, just like sighted children. Through inclusion, they will have the chance to learn a breadth of key skills such as communication, collaboration, joint problem-solving, etc.”
Another interesting piece of news is that Merlin Entertainments announced that LEGOLAND Shanghai Resort is anticipated to open in 2024. LEGOLAND Shanghai will be one of the largest LEGOLAND Resorts in the world and will incorporate a 250-room fully themed hotel on opening. World-leading creative, design, and construction teams will work together to create an immersive theme park, drawing inspiration from famous scenic spots in Shanghai, Jinshan District, and the town of Fengjing. It will be located in the Jinshan District in southwest Shanghai with a two-hour catchment of 55 million people. The region comprising Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Anhui has an estimated population of 220 million.
What do you think? How do you like the new LEGO Chinese New Year and LEGO Monkie Kid sets? Are you planning to get any of them? And do you have any of them from this year? Which one is your favorite? Feel free to share and discuss in the comment section below!
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Ha! I love that fireworks technique! I’m going to steal it! It would be great for the Disney Castle!
Same here. I will steal that technique too. I can’t believe nobody has done it before. The parts are not new. It looks perfect!
Love it, love it, love it! I like them even better than the earlier ones.
I’m the other way around. I like these, but I liked the bright colors of the 2020 sets even better. I’m not complaining though. They are still very nice.
I’m thinking the Festival of the Lanterns would make me a perfect birthday gift…. 🙂 Absolutely lovely set and some interesting new parts as well!
Are the Braille Bricks going to be available for purchase? I know someone who would greatly benefit from it.
Braille Bricks is released through the LEGO Foundation, and they work directly with various organizations for the blind in different countries. They don’t sell retail. I was told that this is because the LEGO Foundation is not set up for selling to consumers directly. In fact, this is the first LEGO set they have ever released.
Hmm, I wasn’t sure on how Braille would work with Chinese, but apparently, it’s used phonetically…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainland_Chinese_Braille
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantonese_Braille
I already have plans to combine the two Chinese new year sets to make a Chinese garden with a wall around it. Can’t wait! 😀
Sounds like a good plan! I’m sure a lot of people think this way. 😀
I don’t like the monkie Kid set as much as the ones from the previous wave, but the Chinese New Year sets are fantastic. Any news on the Ninjago City Gardens?
There has been strange silence about that set. I hope it’s still coming.
No update on the Ninjago set. My guess is that this is because the set is not scheduled until spring of next year. It was a very-very early leak.
These are very nice sets. I’m glad they are offering them outside of China.
Are those two different duplo sets? The minifigs are the same, but the set looks different.
It’s the same set with different alternate builds. 🙂
I love the Monkie Kid sets. I’ve managed to buy most of them.
When will we get the cartoon in the US?
I would imagine the sets would sell better if people know the characters.
There are a few episodes on YouTube and it seems to be done very well.
The production value is very good.
My name is George and I like you to see the best lego that I have made for you to see and I do big models of lego and I became a lego buiter