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LEGO Ideas Tintin Moon Rocket – Designer’s insights

Do you know how to tell the bumbling detectives Thomson and Thompson apart? Or why Hergé put a mammoth on the moon? You’ll find the answers to those questions, and thousands more, at the lovely Hergé Museum in Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. It’s the place to be for fans of everything Tintin, so we couldn’t think of a more appropriate place for The LEGO Group to officially launch the latest LEGO Ideas set: the Tintin Moon Rocket. We were fortunate enough to attend this momentous occasion and talk to fan designer Alexis Dos Santos, LEGO designer Ellen Bowley and Benelux Senior Brand Manager Vincent Andries about what makes this set so special. 3rd-strike: First of all, can you tell us something about your relationship with Tintin? Dos Santos: I grew up in France, and watched the animated series there. It was on TV quite late on Sunday evenings, but I was allowed to watch it because it was Tintin. Later, I read the comics in Portuguese at first because I was living in Portugal at the time. Later, I read them in French too, because those were the original versions. Bowley: When I learned that we were doing the Tintin Ideas set, I just had to ask to be a part of the team. I have loved the series ever since I was a kid. 3rd-strike: How does it feel to be able to present the set here at the Hergé Museum? Dos Santos: It’s a dream come true. A LEGO Ideas set is the highest honour you can achieve as a LEGO fan. The only thing that would be better is being a LEGO designer, I think. If Hergé himself would have been a LEGO enthusiast, I think he would be pleased with the model as well. Andries: This is the first LEGO set based on a European comic book, so that already makes it stand out. We’ve worked closely with our partner Tintinimaginatio to create this set, and so the Hergé Museum made sense as the location for the launch event. 3rd-strike: Hergé is well known for his ligne claire style, with strong, clear lines and simple colours. Was it easy to translate his specific design language to LEGO? Bowley: On one side, it was a really big challenge because of how particular the shape of the rocket is and how iconic it is. On the other side, it’s just red and white. With models like this, you can start with one piece that you know fits really well for a certain part of it. For the rocket, it was the domes on the fins. Those are a really nice shape for that particular part of the rocket. And then it kind of went from there. We found a nice scale for the checkered pattern. It all kind of fit together, but there was a lot of exploration with the scale. We had shorter ones, much taller ones, but the pattern is so iconic with the checks that all of the ones we were trying at different scales, they weren’t quite fitting. Once we defined the shapes, which took a long time, the model just came together because we have all of these red elements and red bricks that we can build it out of. 3rd-strike: Alexis’ original submission for the set was quite different and included a launch tower. How does the original design of the Moon Rocket itself differ from the final product? Dos Santos: It differs a lot, actually, because my original design was mainly aesthetic. The structure was too fragile for an official set. It was suitable for display in a LEGO Community exposition, but not for handling by the general public. Then there’s also that new specialized nose cone piece. I was limited to existing pieces for my design. The top of the rocket is a curved triangle, which is really difficult to get just right in LEGO. Bowley: With the launch tower, the original design depicted a very specific moment from Destination Moon. By taking a few steps back and focusing on the Moon Rocket itself, we made a set that also represents Explorers on the Moon. It also gave us room to include those amazing minifigures alongside the model. 3rd-strike: Ellen, you’ve worked on a wide range of themes, including LEGO Friends and LEGO Wednesday, which are typically more play-oriented themes. How did the design process for a display-focused set like the Moon Rocket differ from your previous work? Bowley: Normally, I’m working on themes for kids, where we’re really focused on play. It’s important that they can build the model and play with it. As you said, this is a much more display-oriented model. The main focus here was getting that iconic shape right. This is the first time that I really tried to build things out of LEGO Technic. This was really interesting as it was definitely a learning curve for me as a LEGO designer. Fortunately, I have amazing colleagues, so I was going to meet people who are experts in mathematics and angles, and people who are experts in shaping. We are a big team of designers that really inspire each other, so I wouldn’t say this was all on me, but I learned a lot. 3rd-strike: Do you feel like the set appeals more to a nostalgic audience, or could this be a gateway into the Tintin universe for the younger crowd? Andries: I think this is a set that will appeal to a wide range of ages. It’s an 18+ set, and most of the people who grew up reading the comic books or watching the animated series are older than that, of course, but the rocket is iconic and will be recognizable for many people, especially here in Belgium. We try to reach our adult audience through specific passion points like vehicles and art. LEGO Botanicals are also a good example. And this particular set is clearly such a passion point as well. Sets like the Moon Rocket allow adults to disconnect from a hyperconnected world. 3rd-strike: The final question is going to be a bit nitpicky, but it’s going to be something the fans will want to know. Is there a reason why Thomson and Thompson’s signature canes are represented by bar pieces instead of recoloring the existing candy cane pieces? Bowley: We have a certain amount of recolours we can do on each model, and the candy cane piece would take two recolours as it’s a dual mould. We did explore it, but there were a lot of things influencing which one we could do in the end. This was just one of the compromises we had to make, I’m afraid. “Earth calling Moon Rocket, are you receiving me?”. We’re not quite done with the LEGO Ideas Tintin Moon Rocket just yet. Just like Destination Moon ended on a cliffhanger, leading into Explorers on the Moon, we’ve got a follow-up for you too. Check back soon as we take a look at the LEGO set itself! We’d like to thank both The LEGO Group and Tintinimaginatio for this opportunity, and Alexis Dos Santos, Ellen Bowley and Vincent Andries for taking the time to answer our questions about this set.