You probably remember a great model of Zagreb national theatre built by Matija Puzar.
Matija is a 30 years young IT-researcher at the University of Oslo, Norway. He is originally from Pula, Croatia, but has moved to Oslo on his quest for a PhD. During the last few years, Matija has been an active (or passive) member of several online communities, such as LUGNET, Trains N Town, and Eurobricks. Offline, he tried to find whether there were other people in the vicinity with the same strange hobby. Surely enough, he found a few of them, and one cold November evening in 2005, the six of them sat down and founded the first Norwegian AFOL group, Brikkelauget.
Recently, we had an honour to chat with Matija about his favourite creation
Why did you decide to build a model of this particular building?
I like that type of architecture, and Zagreb has several candidates (the theatre, the main train station, the art pavilion, to name a few). I should have probably started with something smaller (which I regretted very soon), but I really liked the theatre’s building, as well as its surroundings.
Please, tell me how you approached the design. I know you did the virtual (MLCAD) model first, but did it include all the little details?
I started by looking at the dimensions of the real bricks compared to real people, to see whether LEGO-tiles would match LEGO-minifigs the same way. It seemed it did, so I designed one of the corners:
The windows proved to be a challenge in the beginning, as they had to be SNOT-ted with tiles in between with “nothing” to hold on to. But once I
got the basic idea, it turned out to work very well.
Then I decided to play a little bit with the capital, as my original one was of the wrong type. I ended up with the following design:
I tried to keep to the details as much as I could, but still keeping in mind that it had to be possible to build with bricks (and without getting bankrupt).
Did you change anything from the virtual model while building the model with real bricks?
There were of course a few times when I found out that the way I designed it actually wouldn’t work in reality, mostly in corners where walls would meet. This was a bit unfortunate (although expected), but I managed to keep the usage of bricks as close to the original plan, to avoid coming suddenly into a situation where bricks were missing. Which, of course, did happen.
On pictures, it looks yellow. Is it yellow, right, not tan?
I must say that I hadn’t had the opportunity to see the real building since I started with this project. However, I did remember it to be yellow, and from all the pictures I have seen, it is definitely closer to yellow than tan. This was very much confirmed when I read your blog post where you compared this theatre to the one in Krakow, which was a clear tan-candidate.
Wow, that’s interesting. So what did you base tour design on? Photos, blueprints?
I based my design exclusively on detailed photos made by a friend of mine (she likes to be referred to as “Elgar” 
). She tried also to get some more precise data from the theatre itself, but that proved to be difficult (they wanted official request by letter, which I, just to make a model, really didn’t want to take the trouble to do). Later, after the design was done, I sent them a letter with a picture. I never heard from them.
The difficult part was the roof, as there are very few pictures of it. Actually, I couldn’t find any pictures of the back of the roof, so a little bit of it was improvised. However, that is really not a problem, noone will notice anyway if something is wrong 
Which elements were most difficult to model?
It took me a while to be satisfied with the capitals. The next on the list would be the two diagonal sides at the main entrance. The lower of the two domes took a while to get right, and it certainly did not help that I had to do it twice. The second time was after I realized that the selection of sand-green parts was not as standard and huge as I expected. This was the first time when I first had to look for available parts and quantities, and only then try to build something accordingly.
Well, sand green is quite rare indeed. Where do you get your bricks? Bricklink?
Yes, Bricklink was the only place I could get sand green from - LEGO couldn’t deliver anything (this was before the Green Grocer came out). As for more common parts, I order them through a local retailer.
What are you most proud of this creation?
The fact that I actually managed to force myself to finish it, including the thousands of flowers around (which was very much time consuming and, I must confess, extremely boring).
Did you learn some new building tricks while working on HNK?
This was my biggest project so far, so I had definitely time to get better known with the geometry of the bricks and the possible ways of (ab)using it.
How did you manage to build it in your apartment? After all, it takes a lot of space!
Indeed it does. I was lucky to have a relatively big kitchen and, having it built during winter, a spare table.
Is the theatre building (the model, not the original) one solid piece, or is it modular?
It is most definitely modular. The main point, all the way since I started designing it, was to make it possible to be transported. Here you can see what the various modules are and how they are put together:
…and here you can see more or less how it looks like when it is ready to be transported:
In addition, there are a few more boxes containing the baseplates and gardens around the building, sponsored by LEGO Norge, so that the whole thing would be finished before LEGO World. Otherwise I would probably never have done it due to the cost.
Is it finished, or do you plan to add something to it?
It is LEGO, so it will probably never be completely finished Every time I put it together or take it apart, I find some details I want to fix. However, I have no plans on doing any major changes or additions (which includes doing the interior, which I know you are about to ask next).
Actually, I remember seeing some red support structure inside, so I assumed you have no plans for that. Which leads me to another question - how much does it weight, approximately?
According to the data available from Bricklink, and taking into consideration all the parts not there by design but necessary to hold things together, it should be between 50 and 55 kg.
Where can Klocki readers see this creation in real life?
Currently, the creation can be seen in my basement in Oslo, one box at a time though. I was invited to show it at a few exhibitions, but due to its size and my budget, I can’t promise anything yet. One of the problems is that all those boxes do not fit in my (small) car, and I don’t know how else I can pack it without crashing everyting. Yes, it is very fragile.
I hope this will happen some other day (exhibition, not crashing, of couse). By the way, do you plan to disassemble it ever?
I don’t plan on doing it. I can’t promise anything, though.
Can you tell us what are you working on right now?
Right now I decided to take a longer break. I shortly interrupted the break to make a model of my hometown’s orchestra which this year celebrates its 15th
birthday (here). But I have no other concrete projects in mind.
Yes, I have spotted your orchestra few days ago and blogged it. I must say tt deserves a decent concert hall! Did your friends in Pula like it?
Yes, you actually did say that it deserved a concert hall But I think it is best if they perform outside, the weather is usually good on exhibitions and it is better if people can hear (or at least see) them.
Not all of my friends know about the model yet, I have only spoken to one of them who provided me with the pictures and names of the current active members, and we wanted to have it quiet until it was finished. So, soon, after the final touches are done, we’ll see the reaction.
You live in Norway. Can you describe the AFOL community in Norway?
The AFOL community in Norway is relatively small, but people are slowly coming out of the closet. Norway is, after all, the country with most LEGO sold per capita, so I am sure there is a big potential. This was proven when LEGO this year organized the first LEGO World, where we found several
people who did not know about Brikkelauget (our first and, to my knowledge, only AFOL group in Norway) and who were interested in joining it.
Recently, you have been selected by LEGO to represent the community as LEGO Ambassador. What are your early thoughts on the program?
I think it is a wonderful concept and, from what I have seen, a very successful one. When I was young(er), I remember being very frustrated at not being able to tell the company about how I felt, nor was it possible to get information on things I was wondering about. During the last few years, we have seen a dramatic change in the way LEGO looks at its customers - the LEGO Ambassador program is a perfect example of this, which had already given concrete results. I am very proud to be part of this program, and to be able to make a change, even though it might be a small one.
Thank you very much for taking this interview. I hope to see your amazing theatre is person some day in a future!
Thank you, it has been a pleasure.
Posts