[MOC] 88 Club (Art Deco modular)

[savetheclocktower]

Hi, forum!

For me, LEGO building is a race: I think of something that stokes my creative fire and then try desperately to get it done before I start nitpicking its flaws.

In that spirit, here's my first 32-stud-wide modular building, the only one I've been able to finish to date.

I'm calling this the 88 Club. The Art Deco influences are obvious; much of the façade is based on the former Dagblad Vooruit offices in Ghent, Belgium. The rest of it is stuff I've probably unconsciously stolen from Snaillad and other talented builders. I built it in LDD, ordered waaaaaaay too many parts from BrickLink, and then improvised a bunch of stuff that was not in the LDD plan.

If you squint, that looks like an 88. So I'd much prefer if you squinted.

The first floor is a lounge/bar.

Upon entering, one can see the coat check to the left, staffed by a friendly person who apparently doesn't mind being stuck in that room without any visible exit.

The odd dimensions of this room precluded a traditional door, so I built a removable section of wall.

Ideally, the bar would have a couple of minifigs occupying these stools, but — and I'll let you in on a secret — I didn't have rounded 2x2 plates in medium gray.

There's booth seating near the window.

Going up the stairs (which I obviously copied from Brick Bank), we find a restaurant on the upper floor:

Abstract art hangs on the wall.

The chandeliers are simple because I couldn't build anything more ornate that I didn't end up hating.

The kitchen is small, but then so is the restaurant. Like the coat check, the kitchen has a removable wall.

There's one more feature I wanted to work in somehow: a dumb waiter. It lives up to its name.

Dumb waiters are miniature elevators for drinks and food and whatnot. Hence the bar downstairs can make cocktails for its restaurant guests upstairs.

This car fits into the corner shaft and glides up and down rather easily. I had a whole winch/crank system in my mind that I ended up abandoning because I couldn't get it to work reliably.

So for now one can just use the string to move the car between floors, and affix the stud at the end of the string to one of the roof studs to keep the car on a certain floor.

The whole thing looks great when illuminated.

If I could do it again (and, believe me, I'm too burned out to do it again) I'd probably try to make it a bit smaller so it didn't take up the whoke 32x32 baseplate. And I'd nail down the carpet pattern a bit earlier so as not to have to improvise with whatever tiles I had.

Hope you like it! There are a few more photos in the Flickr gallery.

Edited February 15, 2016 by savetheclocktower

[peedeejay]

Nice! I like the style which is quite different from what we usually see!

[Xyver]

I like it.

Great stlying, great colours, it all just works. The curved window looks great and the pattern above it, while subtle, really adds something extra to the whole building.

That zig zag pattern with the cheese slopes is a work of art.

[cimddwc]

Great, both outside and inside.

[Ex cinno]

Very nice building that captures the Art Deco spirits. I like the idea of a pattern created by the gaps between the small orange slopes.

[jalemac34]

Excellent job, a very different style of my buildings, but very nice to see.....

[Dazz]

I like your creation but in my opinion you really should have added a good deal more minifigures. Your chosen name invokes images of a place that's packed instead of being almost empty.

[savetheclocktower]

I like your creation but in my opinion you really should have added a good deal more minifigures. Your chosen name invokes images of a place that's packed instead of being almost empty.

A fair point. I didn't have many minifigs whose attire fit the theme. I borrowed a few from the Palace Cinema and bought a couple more.