Lego mosaic maker
Best: Overall
Rating: 10/10
Not sure what Lego to go for, especially for an older child? This personalised set really wowed us and would make a fantastic present for anyone, even for a family or an adult.
Select Lego shops have offered a mosaic maker service for about five years using a passport photo-style booth in store. It’s now also available on the Lego website and is a doddle to use. First, upload a photo of yourself, your pet or the recipient of the set, then Lego will produce a pixelated print of the shot in moments to use as a guide for building. This can be printed out or simply followed straight from the screen, which we found helpful when we needed to zoom in on details. A generic set of more than 4,000 tiny square plates and one baseplate is then sent to construct a Lego version of the picture without the need for any written instructions.
It’s a painstaking process, and we made a few mistakes on the way that we had to correct, but this isn’t a Lego build to be rushed. Instead, it relies on serious attention to detail and a fair bit of counting bricks to get it exactly right. We also found it was better left out on a table to return to again and again like a jigsaw rather than a traditional build. Our junior tester loved watching the image of his face emerge in Lego and it would make fantastic bedroom décor if stored in a box frame. The best bit? Different photos can be uploaded any time and the set dismantled and rebuilt following a new guide image to make this something your child can use forever. Genius.