REVIEW: 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival

[Pchan1983]

Here is my review on the other 2022 Chinese New Year set, 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival:

THE GOOD:

• The frozen lake is the star of the set, both the look, design and building experience are excellent.
• Great display piece.
• Love the fishing hole.
• Ice Planet Homage!!!
• 2 variation of the Photo standee.
• Surprisingly no stickers!

THE NOT SO GOOD:

• Lacking Chinese New Year vibes.  

Overall, I had a great time building this set.  The building experience and in terms of display piece, it's probably a better one compared to 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions.  The frozen lake is just great, as I never built anything like this before so the feeling was so refreshing. (It's like the first time building Ninjago City on how you build the water with clear tiles). I'm surprised it wall panels they used as when the set first revealed I thought it would be flat tiles.  It's also great how many little things they fit under the layer of ice.  Even the edges around the lake were fun the build.  It's not just about the lake but a lot of little things around it as well, the fishing hole was nicely done.  The end product just look great, and the same techniques could probably be used to build a huge ice skating arena.  Surprisingly no stickers too.  Well, 80108 did have a few so I thought the signage pieces would be stickers but it came as printed.  Now I do really question what exactly is LEGO's policy on whether it's going to be printed or stickers.  One thing though, I do feel the set lacking Chinese New year vibes.  May be because the focus in the lake or the big portion of white colour but even so, there are minimum Chinese New year decor compared to other chinese new year sets.  So in terms of a Chinese New Year set, 80108 is probably better in this regard.  This is more like an oriental winter village.  Anyway this is no doubt an excellent lego set that I would recommend to everyone.  I was also one of those who wished LEGO to continue with base plates and modular compatible but after building this, I think the current design totally works, and it's massive (way bigger than what I thought it would be compared to the photos).  Hope you enjoy this set the way I did if you bought this or going to buy this.

[alvinofdiaspar]

I can't wait to get my hands onto those (opalescent?) panels for the lake.  Not having stickers is one of the reasons why I chose to go with this set instead of the diorama this year.

As to the vibe - it's probably distantly related to the Harbin Ice Festival, which isn't really a CNY thing per se.

Edited December 24, 2021 by alvinofdiaspar

[eric_son_of_joseph]

Thank you for providing a great overview of the set.  It does look like a fun build with some great pieces.  Looking forward to purchasing one for myself soon

[Pchan1983]

14 hours ago, alvinofdiaspar said:

As to the vibe - it's probably distantly related to the Harbin Ice Festival, which isn't really a CNY thing per se.

yea, and I think they starting to run out new traditions to base off on.  We already got most, so with 8 more zodiacs to go, I think they might start rehashing new years eve dinner or dragon dance.

 

12 hours ago, eric_son_of_joseph said:

Thank you for providing a great overview of the set.  It does look like a fun build with some great pieces.  Looking forward to purchasing one for myself soon

I hope you will enjoy it too =)

[alvinofdiaspar]

12 hours ago, Pchan1983 said:

yea, and I think they starting to run out new traditions to base off on.  We already got most, so with 8 more zodiacs to go, I think they might start rehashing new years eve dinner or dragon dance.

I would love to see them tackle some CNY botanicals - like Enkianthus quinqueflorus Lour. (colloquially known as "hanging chimes flower").  I have the 80101 CNY Eve Dinner - it's a very fun set with some unique food tiles (it was a pain to import to Canada since it was originally Asia-Pacific only) - I definitely wouldn't mind a redo!

Edited December 25, 2021 by alvinofdiaspar

[Polarlicht]

I hoped those lake pieces were translucent 6x6 tiles... Still great parts in these sets..