The good folks at Lego brought their attraction to Louisville, Ky this past weekend and graced us with plenty of things to do and see. See what we thought after the jump.
At this point the Lego Kids Fest is about halfway through it’s tour and still has Wisconsin, Texas, and Ohio still left to visit. So if you ever enjoyed Legos, have kids or just want to give something new a try this is the perfect event for you. As a matter of fact stop reading right now and go purchase your tickets if you are within range of one of these dates. This is a great time and even better if you are attending as a family. What’s so great about it? Where do I begin? I suppose I have to start somewhere.
The first thing I want to mention is the location. While this is highly dependent on the facility in each area, our event was booked at the KY Fair and Expo center which offered a ton of room and regardless of the Kids Fest only using one hall, there was plenty of room for each attraction and exhibit. On top of this the booking department I’m convinced is a panel of super geniuses due to booking only certain time windows for every visitor instead of a ticket that is good for the entire day. While at first I was turned off with this and perhaps if you wanted to make a whole day event out of things this wouldn’t be too ideal, but I felt like we had plenty of time to enjoy all the areas during our 9am – 1:30pm window. The genius part of this setup is that it keeps crowd control at an idea level. A lot of the exhibits here were hands on and required participation so a ginormous crowd could have easily ruined the experience, but instead at most we were met with wait times ranging from 0 to 10 minutes. I never really felt like I was wasting my time in a line like so many other events I have attended.
By the time our window was up we ALL felt satisfied with our experience and none of us felt like anything was missed. In fact the only real downside I can see with this doesn’t really fall on the consumer side. At the start of our day we ate a pretty decent breakfast and was out in time to leave and grab lunch somewhere. The food at the expo center was a bit pricey (which most likely was set by the venue), but with being in there for a short window we didn’t feel the need to purchase anything. I’m not sure who cares in this scenario, but with the attendance windows I imagine someone is losing out on some revenue from concessions. Again for the attendee this is great since you aren’t stuck there all day eating meals and paying a billion dollars for it.
But what did we do while we there? Let’s get to the good stuff! When you first enter the event you are greeted by some excellent and breathtaking Lego statues that I can only imagine took way longer than I have the patience for. These statues are amazing and I honestly wouldn’t even know where to begin when trying to build one of these. Each of them were crafted with such precision I doubt that anyone’s first impression would be that these were even made from Legos looking at a distance. I have played with Legos since I was a young boy and I have since continued the tradition with my son that is now six years old. We dump all of our blocks out in the living room and let our imaginations run wild, but we also build creations that I imagine look like most other peoples. We usually end up building a house, a robot, maybe a spaceship or two… But nothing even remotely similar to this… 
That’s right, if you zoom in on this thing it’s made out of who knows how many blocks and the crazy thing is that it looks absolutely perfect. That is the case with every statue I came across. There is so much detail and such amazing likenesses, there is no doubt that these creations are a labor of love for the creators. Here is a small gallery of some of the sculptures that were on display.
As impressive as these are, this is far from being the only thing that this festival is about. There isn’t anything like seeing these guys in person, but I did kind of expect to see some amazing sculptures. What I didn’t know was how long the event would hold our attention if we are moving from one exhibit to another.
I was completely caught off guard when I realized how interactive this event was. These statues were featured when you walk in and then spread out around the venue, but in between were a numerous amount of “stations” that featured many different ways to interact and experience the Lego culture. Our first stop was a shield building experience that let children or anyone for that matter decorate their own personal shield and put on display for everyone in the event to see. My son loved decorating his personalized piece and was thrilled to place it on display. Not only did he love showcasing his work, but being able to see what others create was awesome and what Legos are all about. The fun didn’t stop with shields either, there were quite a few stations like this and each one had a different theme to it.
You would go from decorating a shield to building with only purple blocks, or even building your own Jedi Knight or Sith Lord. I even found this guy…
I wish I could take credit, but I would have never thought to build this in a million years. One station had two rules, everyone participated and the other is a two minute time limit to build whatever you wanted. My son wanted to build a shed, so we know what that meant…
I told you, we don’t make amazing sculptures at our house! After completing our shed we were told to dismantle and exit the area, but don’t forget to grab our gift on the way out. You heard me right, so many of these attractions featured small gifts for everyone to take home. (And I don’t just mean the kids) These included a few small minifigs and a couple of mini sets, but you can’t really ask for much more than that.
One of the most interesting stations was a floor map of the United States surrounded by Lego building tables. You were asked to build anything you wanted and then drop your creation off to one of the staff and tell them what state to put your piece in. I thought this was a super cool project and I would love to see this piece at it’s later stages. Here is what it looked like during my attendance.
One last thing I want to quickly mention is the Lego stores that are set up in the venue. There were two areas that I noticed setup for merchandise sales. I’m not sure what your experience is with this kind of thing, but I expected to be gouged for anything that we decided to purchase. I was floored to find that not only were all the prices reasonable but some of these sets were cheaper to buy here than at your local toy store. This was yet another aspect of the experience that I wasn’t expecting and was pleasantly surprised by.
I could go on and on about every little thing that I saw or that we did, but something like this is best left to experience for yourself. There are plenty of areas that I didn’t even mention like the Lego Dimensions setup, or the class with the Master Builders, or even the massive pile of Lego blocks in the middle of the show floor. It was truly a fun filled day and served to remind both children and adults how much fun Legos can be and gave my family a great day of fun and memories to share for quite some time. If you are able to make any of the remaining dates, I highly recommend you do so.
For more information visit the Official Site.
