Quarantine for the Originals

[leafan]

Hi all,

I've noticed myself doing something strange and wanted to know if anyone else that has come out of a Dark Age has experienced it or not...

I still have my boyhood collection and have since accumulated loads more Lego, but for some reason I feel the compulsion to keep the boyhood collection separate from the rest of the Lego.

When all I had was my boyhood collecton (especially my Knights and Spacemen), I used to fantasize about putting those minifigs into the new sets I'd get and roleplay that they'd reached the promised land amongst the wonders I could now purchase; but instead I feel like if I do that, there will be no way of making them distinct from the new knights and spacemen that I get, and they'll effectively be lost to me.

I thought about marking them in some way, but that seemed like willful destruction; so the best thing I can think of is to insert something (like folded paper) into the foot/leg holes so that I can find them again.

I'm quite aware that I sound like a nutter saying this, and maybe I just need to get over it, but although I have 20 other knights/spacemen that look the same - they aren't *my* boyhood memories.

So I have a Really Useful box full of rarely played with Lego now :/

Just me?

[Peppermint_M]

I think I understand your point. Maybe you can start incorporating it in "places of honour" in builds and MOCs. The Knights become the honour guard, the spacemen the captains of the crews. That way you know which is which. But yeah, those guys are special.

I keep everything combined in my collection, but I have been without a dark age, so my childhood collection is my LEGO collection (wow maaan, deep). My MOCs still use parts that I have had for 25 years and parts I bought just a few days before.

[icm]

I keep my childhood collection separate from sets I've bought as an adult.  I think of it this way: if I want a vintage set, I can get it.  If I want to build a creation from vintage parts, I can.  If I want to build a new and improved version of a childhood creation, I can.  But if I part out my childhood creations and mix them all up with parts I've bought as an adult, I can't get that childhood thought process back if I ever try to rebuild them.

[leafan]

Ha! Knew I wasn't alone.

I think the paper in leg approach may be the way to go.

[Andy D]

I do not have anything like this situation.  My earliest sets that I had were from the early 1990's and were as an adult, no childhood sets. Those sets are all gone, I donated them in the 1990's and I hope someone else got a lot of enjoyment from them.

However, if I did have vintage sets I would keep them as sets and separated from my modern sets. But, I would use some assemblies and minifig in my modern MOCs just to remind me when I came from, but when the MOC was disassembled the parts, minifigs, whatever would go back to their sets.

So yes, I am for separate storage, but integrated usage.

Andy D

[ShaydDeGrai]

Growing up, I didn't have enough lego to be able to afford to keep sets as sets, it was all about tear down, recombine and reuse.  I kept all the instructions in case I wanted to build the factory model again but my "collection" was really about parts, not kits.

As for those parts, I haven't made a conscious effort to keep them separate for sentimental reasons, but they are somewhat sequestered for practical ones.  I have some old Samsonite Lego (sold in the US half a century ago) that just doesn't mix well with "modern" Lego - color mismatches, scratches, mold variations, etc.  I only use it when I think it brings something special to the table, which, given its age and its condition and the type of MOCs I usually build, isn't very often.  I do like my old faceless, armless "slabbies" ( I even remember when mini-figures were first introduced and I recall, at the time, liking the Slabbies better ), but, again, they typically don't mix well in a modern context.  

In most cases the modern bricks are just better, I remember the days when we used Roof Tiles 2x4/45  done in clear as windscreens and thinking that the stippling of the roof texture and the half circles visible where the internal tubes connected were really distracting.  Once I got windscreens that you can actually see through and looked "real," these old trans-clear slopes went into a box that I don't think I've opened in 40 years.  I know they're there so if there ever comes a day when I need a yellowed trans-clear roof slope for some reason, I've got a couple dozen, but that day hasn't happened yet (and I've been at this for a while). 

[koalayummies]

Not alone, I keep my old Lego mostly separate from the newer stuff as well. Did mix some in the past but returned it all to being separate. I also thought it was weird to make this distinction but the colors are different, the prints aren't as detailed, the molding and plastic connects and moves differently with noticeably different clutch power. Ended up donating a lot of the old Lego to one of my friends kids and am contemplating selling off all the old stuff as I just prefer building with the newer pieces. Not as much into collecting anymore as building MOCs.

I agree with @ShaydDeGrai that the modern bricks are better.

[Blondie-Wan]

It’s totally up to the individual. Some folks are fine mixing their stuff from any and all eras, while others divvy them up... and for those who do, I’m sure there are lots of different dividing lines - one builder might put the line between the 1990s and the 2000s, another between the 1980s and ‘90s, another back at the dawn of the minifigure era in 1978. All are fine.

[Aanchir]

Often times my older minifigs have been “quarantined” from my newer ones but not purposefully or out of some reverence for those nostalgic themes, but because a lot of my childhood sets are in pieces and most of those sets and figs were rather mediocre compared to the ones I enjoy collecting, displaying, and MOCing today. As a result I haven’t felt too much incentive to fill in the gaps in my collection for those themes I was less thorough about collecting, nor to intermix, say, my old Ninja or Divers or Aquazone or Rock Raiders sets and figs with my more recent Ninjago or Atlantis or Power Miners ones.

That said… one possible factor in having such a different attitude towards the themes of my childhood (besides the admitted weak designs associated with so many of the 90s sets, themes, and figs I grew up with compared to today’s much stronger design standards) is that I never really had a “dark age”… as such, when I was ready to move on from any particular theme, it typically had less to do with some misguided sense that LEGO wasn’t cool or grown-up enough for me anymore and more with deciding another newer theme had more to offer in terms of storytelling, design quality, play value, and inspirational value.

Are there sets I regret not getting? Sure — but less in the sense that their designs still hold up as something I wish I had today, and more out of realizing that the sets I did get might not have been the best ones available to me around that time (for example, I got the U.F.O. Alien Avenger instead of the far more interesting Interstellar Starfighter, the 2004 Castle of Morcia instead of the 2005 Vladek’s Dark Fortress, etc). So many sets back then were advertised so poorly that I didn’t learn about some of their coolest features until years later.

Edited October 18, 2018 by Aanchir

[LucyCol]

I mostly use Technic, and keep the studded Technic separate from the studfree, lots of sets I regret not getting due to my 'Dark Ages' I could go back and get them, but not at the silly prices people want for them.

[Larry Andersen]

I used to do that until storage space became an issue.  Now I throw all the parts together as building stock.

[dr_spock]

I do.  My 30+ years old stuff stays home on the display shelf.  The newer stuff goes to LUG events, then gets shredded, and built into something else for other events.  It's an endless cycle. 

[TeriXeri]

I had a 15 year dark age with no new sets (2001-2016), and I haven't mixed the old and the new. (old sets are displayed or stored away from the newer as well).

Even while I had the urge to "fix" old lego sets via bricklink, I rather just started anew.

Getting "used" parts doesn't feel the same, and there's not many "new" old grey parts, and also you run into the different part varations.

Especially since there's the time gap, the grey/bley difference is obvious, not to mention the age/wear/scratches/recolors, some of the old LEGO is older then myself.

Sealed sets or promotional remakes (like the Classic Knight minifigure in 2016) could be considered exceptions and new.

Edited October 27, 2018 by TeriXeri