What is your FOL origin story?

[brobert]

I've been reminded by my facebook this morning, that it was exactly 3 years ago today, when I left my "dark ages" behind. 

It made me curious, probably many of you have interesting stories about how you started your LEGO (Star Wars) collection, most of you definitely much earlier than me.

So if you feel like it, please share your "origins": what was your first SW set? How did you start? Where did you get with it to this point?

(Sorry if another topic like this exists, I searched the first 10 pages, and didn't find anything similar, so I thought I'd start a new one.)

[brobert]

So to start with, here's mine: 

Like I mentioned, it was exactly 3 years ago when I bought my first LEGO set for myself. I don't really remember why I decided, but I was always fascinated by LEGO and was a huge SW was since I was 9.

However, I was living in rural Hungary, so my parents couldn't really afford to buy such expensive toys for me. But that didn't stop me from building my very first rookie "MOC"-s even at that young age from small promotional bags found in chips bags, and some cheap knockoff parts. My very first one was I think a small X-wing that I still have to this day at home (The second I think was the starship Voyager from ST).

Then when I finally got a decently paying job, and I could afford it, I bought my very first official LEGO SW set, the 9492 TIE Fighter. Then I went on with a rebel snowspeeder, and later I could make a barter business through my blog so I could buy the AT-AT. And long story short, now I am at the point where I'm starting to have problems with where to put my future sets :)

[MaxTube55]

My SW FOL story started in 2013. I was a LEGO fan though since 2009 when I was 6 and got my very first set 8402. But my first encounter with LEGO Star Wars was 75015 when my brother got it as a gift, but I had though Star Wars was stupid (very ironic because I am now obsessed) and I though that up until I saw Rebels (around October during Season 2) and fell in love. My first set I bough for myself was 75075 and long story in the last year I now have a total of 22 sets (11 SW, 1 Racers, 1 Cars, 1 Speed Champions, 1 Technic, 1 book, 2 polybags, and 3 collectible minifgs), one of which is a UCS set 75095, and I will continue to get more for as long as I can. Hope I will keep having room to store my future sets!

[RetroInferno]

I grew up with the 1999 Starwars line up and bought stuff up to 2005. I started back in early 2015 and had the chance ( very lucky ) to grab most of 2014 wave, which I consider one of the best year with 2013. 

Still I missed a lot of cool sets, especially Jabba related, but that time period was also filled with Clone Wars stuff and I really hate the mini-fig style of that period. 

I've been a pretty heavy gamer in the dark age period but I've let that go now ( too much time consuming and games keep letting me down ) so I guess I came back to my first love hahaha. 

 

[dmaclego]

Wow, guys, you make me feel VERY old ;) .

My first LEGO set was All-terrain Vehicle 6927 (not Star Wars but close enough ;) ) back in 1982 :D . My dark age came in the 90's but I wisely kept my whole LEGO collection. Then in 1997 I bought my first LEGO set in years: Technic 8459. As you can see, I came back to the hobby quite a while before LEGO Star Wars era and when the first sets finally appeared, I started buying them for my sons. We built them together, of course, but now as I think of it.... no, I never bought a Star Wars set for myself :D . And finally, in 2004, disgusted with the official set 7166, I started working on my own Lambda-class Imperial shuttle, which eventually, years later, thanks to my friend and LEGO designer Adam, became the UCS set 10212. The rest is history :) .

 

 

[Cjd223]

I have had Legos as long as I can remember.  Ever since I was 3, and Bionicles came out, I loved them.  Early on I did not play with bricks nearly as much as I did with Bionicles, the whole story caught my attention and I loved every aspect of it.  To this day I would say that my best memories are with the Mata Nui and Metru Nui Bionicle sets.

As for Star Wars, as a young child I had all of the mini builds that could be combined, the only large Star Wars set that I had was the 7259 Arc-170.  Then I hit my dark ages starting around 9 years old, way too early!  There I remained until Fall of my freshman year of High School.  Earlier that year I had gotten my old Bionicles back from someone in my neighborhood that received them from my 10 year old self.  The reason I got them back was for my 5 year old sister, who I knew should get to play with a toy that I had played with in my early childhood.  After 4 months of having Lego back in my house, I purchased the UCS R2-D2 set.  From there on out I was hooked again, and with the announcement of The Force Awakens playing a large role in how I became so involved with Star Wars. 

[Lobot]

I was raised in the early 80's with a combination of Classic Space and Technic sets, including the highly impressive 8851 Excavator which was nothing short of phenomenal to a 10 year old, especially as it was one of the very first to run a pneumatic system.  I'll admit it does look a little dated these days, but I'll never forget the control system and the magic of it all.

I then moved onto being a teenager, and onto other hobbies, and I eventually passed my complete collection onto my nephew.  Scroll forward to about 2009 and Mrs Lobot bought me a 10178 Motorised AT-AT for Christmas - I think it was intended to be a joke, but it's fair to say that she's regretted it ever since!  I don't remember having a better Christmas; as it gradually took shape it triggered something long-buried in me and even my dad was impressed to finally see it lurch across the floor!  Since then I've focused on collecting SW sets, interspersed with the occasional Technic one.  Over time I've gradually refined my interests and predominantly focus on UCS.  It's a great hobby, but 2016 has been a low-point for me in terms of sets; hopefully TLG will have something stunning for 2017 

[nymmerod]

I got my first Lego set for Christmas 1987. Black Falcon's Fortress (6074). I only got a few more small sets over the next few years and then sort of "grew out" of Lego. I left all of that old stuff at my mom's house when I moved out for college.

Then in 1999 I bought Slave I (7144). I came out of the dark ages for that one set, then jumped right back into my dark ages until 2012.

In 2012, I bought Gandalf Arrives (9469) and was so taken with it that I eventually bought the entirety of the Lord of the Rings/Hobbit lineup.

When that theme was discontinued I started pouring my expendable income into the Star Wars sets.

I always secretly wanted to be more involved in Lego but limited finances as a child, and a perceived negative stigma as an adult kept me from fully engaging in the hobby until recently. My parents/family think I'm insane now that I've spent thousands on Lego all told. But I love it.

[Magmafrost]

I've lived my whole life with Lego, so there's not really any story. I got my first lego product on my first birthday, 18 years ago, and the closest I've come to a dark ages was not buying any lego in 2006 (still trying to figure out what happened there.) I refuse to believe I missed a Star Destroyer and a Slave I on shelves together, not to mention its the year exo-force came out, which I absolutely loved. I have vivid memories of 2005 and 2007 sets on shelves, and physical proof that I bought them, but not 2006 sets. 

Can any Australians older than me confirm that those sets were in fact available in Australia? Just to be sure that a supply issue isn't the reason for this inexplicable hole in my life?

Edited October 6, 2016 by Magmafrost

[Schneeds]

I grew up with the awesome space and pirate sets of the 80s.  The Black Seas Barracuda and the Mega Core Magnatizer were my prize possessions.  I stopped collecting just after the very first Star Wars sets were released back in 1999.  I think that first Slave 1 was the last set I bought. 

Then in 2012 my brother bought some galaxy squad sets to give away at a toys for tots type thing and the wave of nostalgia was too much for me.  I've been back ever since. 

[Flandy]

Being born in 1978 there are two things that I had as absolute constants growing up, and those were Star Wars and Lego. I love both and I'm sure many can relate to the comfortable feeling of familiarity and excitement when watching the movies, or when a large box of unsorted Lego is present on a lazy Sunday afternoon. I think my very first lego was a Fabuland car that I was bought as a very young child. I managed not to swallow any of it, so presumably my parents thought I might be ok with Lego, and while there may have been some sets in between, the next set I remember getting was the legendary 928 Galaxy Explorer, though there must have been some others before that. Probably up to the age of about 14-15 I collected lego, mainly space and town stuff, with some trains, but towards the end it was all technic. The classic black chassis with the flat 4 engine, the Red supercar with the pop up headlights and V4, and the yellow JCB style digger. But then Cars took over. Lego had given me a great start, and led me to love all things mechanical and designing and building things, and a love of cars had developed, so i spent the next 20 years modifying cars.

Fast forward to Christmas 2015 and having seen The Force Awakens, My G/F decided it'd be nice to buy me The Millenium Falcon as a cool gift. How right she was. I think the Early Lego Star Wars releases were pretty shonky looking, so even though I'd seen them on shelves, and even bought my Nephews sets, they'd failed to rekindle my Lego tendencies, but the Falcon really worked a treat. I'm not sure she'd have bought it if she knew how the Lego would have taken over, but the cat's out of the bag now, and I've been buying most of what's out there, finding older sets I've missed out on, and discovered the joys (and frustrations it has to be said!) of Bricklink. Given that so far it's been 9 months and the sets have taken over the shelves in the living room, and the spares trays are expanding exponentially, I think I'm going to need to build an extention on the house.........

Edited October 6, 2016 by Flandy

[Tavis75]

Grew up with the classic space sets, plus Technic and the odd other set, plus general Star Wars toys before selling it on as I got older.

Then saw the first UCS sets Tie-Interceptor and X-Wing, as I'd just got a bonus from work I bought the Tie-Interceptor and the X-Wing followed a while later. Didn't significantly get into Lego, just had them as display pieces to which I added the UCS Star Destroyer and UCS AT-ST. Then my girlfriend moved in and I decided to sell the Lego :(

Move on a few years and the girlfriend became the wife, then the ex-wife. Then earlier this year I was bored and hungover on a grey Sunday and ended up picking up the First Order Tie-Fighter, which was fun, then had £50 of Tesco Clubcard vouchers and they were doing an offer that doubled the value of the vouchers, so picked up the Millennium Falcon, by this point I was starting to get hooked and Kylo Ren's shuttle and Poe Dameron's X-Wing joined the collection.

At this point I was also doing a fair amount of overtime at work and things went a bit nuts... So now have all the current available Star Wars UCS sets bar the Tie-Fighter (but as I have £70 of VIP points I think I will be picking that one up shortly) and I'm working on Brick Linking the UCS B-Wing.

[dimnico]

I have been a starwars fan since I was about three, I am much, much older than that now! (lets just say I saw Return of the Jedi at the cinema!) I have been collecting Star Wars memorabilia since that time too. However I was quite slow getting into lego starwars. It was until 2010 that I got my first sets, Slave 1 (8097), Battle of Endor and the original MOs Eisley Cantina. My original intention was to keep them in the box but the child in me couldn't resist and so I built Slave 1 and Endor, I have still kept Mos Eisley in the unopened box however as this is a bit of a collectors piece. 

From there I bought a few more sets, micro fighters etc and then with the release of The Force Awakens I decided to buy the whole of wave 1. Also picking up the amazing death star set too as a christmas gift to myself, which my wife helped me build! 

It was until I purchased the Battle on Takodana set that I felt a bit disappointed and felt that Lego had missed a trick by only releasing a tiny portion of what in my eyes is one of the best locations from The Force Awakens. Thats when I decided to build my own version. I had so much fun creating my own builds that I have now put most of my energy into building my own MOCs. Nothing has been quite as large scale as my Maz Kanata Castle moc but I am really enjoying the process. 

My son is quickly getting to the age where he will be able to play with lego too and I imagine we are going to have some great times building together, thats the dream anyway! 

[Brickinho]

Sorry for my bad english. I'm not writing in english very often....

I stopped playing with LEGO about 23 years ago (I guess). Long before the first LEGO Star Wars sets. Last year my son was born. And from the moment of his birth, I realised, that some day, we can play with LEGO together. To prepare for this day, I bought 75094 Imperial Shuttle Tydirium last september. That was just the first. 'Til christmas, I added the Millenium Falcon, an X-Wing, Kylo Renn's Command Shuttle and some other sets to my collection. That escalated quickly... This year, we bought a house. So I stopped spending money on toys. Until I ordered the Death Star last week.....

Edited October 6, 2016 by Brickinho

[MartinCliffe]

I had LEGO Town and Space as a child (born in 78); I distinctly remember having the Police Station and Fire Station for Christmas and the Bike Shop for my birthday the same year. Entered my dark ages in my mid teens, and other than a small handful of SW sets I picked up (original AT-AP, Naboo Starfighter, V-Wing and a few battle packs) I could never really justify spending the money on LEGO (mortgages, bills, guitars (I'm a semi-pro musician) and other things came higher up the priority list and money was always tight). Then we moved to Hong Kong in 2013. All of a sudden, we had money. So I officially came out of my dark ages when I got the 75055 ISD for Christmas 2014, and the bug bit. I could have bought another car (or a couple of really nice guitars) with the money I've spent on LEGO since...

[Crabr Brbel]

Lego and Star Wars were two of my 'go to' toys growing up. I had Lego as a kid, mainly the original space theme and town. I remember getting the Police station for Christmas in 1988! Once I hit my teens, I decided I was too big for Lego and gave it away to my younger cousin. Fast forward 26 odd years, and I had to have surgery which required a rest period of 4-6 weeks. My wife bought me 75074 Snow-speeder micro-fighter to build one day while she was out at work. I built a couple of micro-fighter models before getting the 75139 Battle of Takodana. Been building it on and off for about 6 months now and finished it last night. Trying to decide what do get next! Anyway I am glad I came out of the dark ages and am now recovered from the surgery too!

[Robianco]

I actually remember having a wooden box of Lego when I was very young... it had a sliding lid which was a pice of hardboard which was printed on one side and it slide into grooves into the side of the box to close it. That had the old style figures in it which has 2x2 brick bodies etc... I think the minifigures still had the moulded stump arms rather than full articulation. I then remember having some castle stuff and maybe some city stuff with the torsos being stickers etc. Anyway... As I was born in 1973 there was a film released when i was very young that kind of changed everything and from the age of around 6 or so my life was completely focused on Star Wars figures. From the point I entered early teenage years it was then music and various other things that occupied my time. Goodbye toys of all descriptions.

When I finished Uni I was working in a design agency and one of the younger lads bought the first Snowspeeder set and built it in his lunch break. I loved it... but never bought any Lego at that point. Then a neighbours of my parents had a pirate ship smashed up by unruly cousins at Christmas and they brought it in on Boxing Day when we were visiting so I built it back up mostly from the box and thought it was great... again... no Lego purchased. Then around 6 or so years go at a Christmas party for work I got a Hoth Battlepack as a secret santa gift. At around 2.30am after retiring to my room at the hotel I opened it and built it (surprisingly). It was downhill from there. X-Wing, TIE Fighter, Falcon, Slave 1 all followed quickly. Couple of Hoth sets after that... I was in deep with SW. Then I got a cheap Batman set for £4 from Tesco... then I wanted all the Batman figures... then that got silly. I was fine with just SW and DC but then I visited the Museum and they had a Witchcraft exhibition on... and someone had displayed 4842 Hogwarts and 4738 Hagrid's Hut and I thought they looked great. I'd bought my daughter the Forbidden Forest for around £3.50 on clearance and that was around in her toys still so I ended up picking up the last two waves of Harry Potter also.

Thankfully I try to limit my Lego spend on OT stuff (I'm still undecided on RO until I've seen it) and DC.

[The Brick King]

During one of my birthday parties when I was younger, my best friend gave me my first exposure to Lego AND Star Wars: The Clone Walker from 2008. After I built it, I became obsessed with both, buying any Star Wars set I could get my hands on, and watching all of the movies (Up until that point I thought it was just some weird freak show.) Soon, my love became vast, bringing me to where I am today: A LEGO collector and Star Wars maniac. (I even like the Prequels! GASP!)