Trent

Thanks for the information. Were the 1x2 flats studded or tiles?

Brilliant! I can only echo what sok117 has said - the sign is excellent, and I love the ice-cream counter.

Very nice, I really like the smoothness of the hood and the lights. The ice-cream dispenser is great too...nice little set.

Yeah, I've been in to my local Smiths at either 12 or 1 each day and they've been totally cleared out.

Excellent; instantly recognisable and a good use of parts!

That's my Christmas present sorted - thanks heaps!

Very nice work; suitably atmospheric.

They do look good - and I'd love some GBP ones if they were ever made.

Brilliant work; I love the bus in particular!

Very nice; I like the tiles on the roof and the brickwork in particular.

This is a really great idea for a topic, with a brill first post - I'm looking forward to learning a lot from someone who makes MOCs that I admire so much. Thank you.

I really like this - it's nice to see Pride being represented in Lego form!

This is excellent - great work!

I've been using a similar technique to bulk up my blue plates, and I've been adding translucent blue, green and clear cheese pieces to add texture to the water as well. It seems to work really well, and give a nice effect. Thanks for sharing pictures of your style.

My god, this is absolutely wonderful! I don't really know where to start because so much of this is epic, but the thing that really makes this model stand out is the attention to detail - it's the carvings in the rock, it's the way the sea has been built up, it's the stonework on the balconies... It's brilliant; thanks for sharing it.

Huge congratulations to the winners - the standard was very high. Thanks to everyone who entered (and to those who organised it); I really enjoyed looking at all of your entries.

This is absolutely wonderful - a brilliantly realistic semi, with some great touches (such as the milk on the doorstep). The front door area is lovely, as is the curved bay window. The fireplace is also excellent, and I love the hallway tiled floor (mine is a bit like that!). Each time I look at it, I find something new to love - the brickwork is excellent, as is the stair bannister, the mobile over the baby's crib, the telephone, the armchair in the living room...the detail in this is amazing. I would be so proud of myself if I built something like this...it's exceptionally good.

I'd go with Locutis' suggestion.

I think the water tower is the best that I've seen in a long time. Brilliant.

That's a really clever and practical design; great stuff.

The exposed brick is fantastic - a really great detail to add. I also like the boarded up window; it really adds to the scene that you've created. The small details really add to the build, such as the blinds in the window, the rubbish, the items in the shop window, the detail in the thin building, the machinery on the back of the buildings...and also, all of the small stories of the characters - the busker, the delivery man, the punk with his letter etc. It's fabulous - I've been looking at it for ages trying to take it all in.

Well, quite - but both of those things that you've described come under the second paragraph of my post: buying intending to sell on, and buying to build but the build not happening, so you end up selling on. What I was saying was that I don't understand people keeping MISB boxes and intending never to open them. That's where there's a paradox, because the value is in the belief that the Lego is in the box - the Lego doesn't have to be in the box to command a high price; there just has to be confidence in the product. What other people do with their money is totally up to them, but I just figure that if you never intend to take the bricks out of the box and you're a collector rather than a seller...then it doesn't really matter what's in the box (because you'll never know)...

Great idea for an MOC - and I love the first and last ones particularly. Great work!

I think some of it is lack of understanding - I can appreciate that someone else might like to have a row of MISB sets up on a shelf, but because I take my enjoyment out of putting the bricks together, I don't fully understand why someone would just look at the boxes. That's not to say you can't do it, or you're wrong for doing it - but just that I don't understand it. I can understand (although I don't really agree with it) people buying MISB to sell on; you're making yourself a middle man in a retail situation if you didn't ever intend to build it and hoping to make a profit from it - and I can understand owning a set that you didn't get around to building (life does sometimes get in the way), discovering that it's leapt up in price and you feel that you'd be best off selling it and reinvesting the money in other sets. ...but I don't really understand buying MISB secondhand. It's always nice to build with new bricks, but I think I would be fearful that the box didn't contain Lego. It always crosses my mind when you hear stories of MISB collectors getting a new secondhand MISB set - if nobody has ever opened it, how do you know it's Lego in it? It's a bit of a Schrödinger's cat situation...

I went to the public show this year, and I will hope to attend that again next year. I don't really know anyone who would go with me for a longer duration than an afternoon (none of my mates are Lego fans) so I'm not sure I'd be able to do AFOLCON itself.