sin

Yes that is correct, 1851 parts to go from 7 BL orders and 1 PAB order. I was forced to place a bunch of smaller orders looking for rarer parts and minifig pieces and most of those arrived 3 to 4 days after I initially ordered. PAB is only 159 pieces and my three largest BL orders are 988, 352 and 185 parts none of which have arrived yet. 3 of the remaining are about 60 parts and the last is only for the 'wig' that was a pain to find. I threw in about 100 pieces unrelated to the GG project into that order to make it worth my while. I had to do the same for the order that had the minifig heads and lime colored cherries. On the plus side I now have 15 dark flesh, 15 dark tan, 15 dark blue-grey and 90 light blue-grey 1 x 2 bricks with the bricks etching on the side plus some cool printed 2 x 2 tiles

I would be bummed, Star Wars sets are what brought me out of my dark ages and comprise over 100 of the 140 sets I own. If it happened I would probably just use all of the money I spend on SW waves on bricks to make modular mocs.

I couldn't agree more, I have a slightly sadistic love of making excel sheets for things that have nothing to do with work! My last BL order was invoiced yesterday so I have a final cost for this project - $404.65 including shipping charges and tax, I am quite pleased with that and it comes in a minimum of $200 less than if I would have ponied up for an original set. Well worth the effort. BL orders were trickling in Friday and Saturday, 8 have been received with 7 more plus my PAB order on the way - I now have 554 out of 2405 pieces total. I am keeping my fingers crossed that I can start building this by the end of this week but I'll have to see what was on back order from PAB first.

The interior of that market is looking awesome! I'm looking forward to seeing more

Yes, but not right away. I need to let the budget recover a bit and both of my kids birthdays are in a couple of months. I have started looking at the parts lists for both though. I'ill definitely do Cafe Corner before Market Street, MS is probably my least favorite in terms of looks. CC will require some more inventive part swapping to keep the cost manageable, but I will want to stick with colors in the actual set like I am doing with GG. I can't let you get me thinking about this too much right now! Maybe late Spring...

Ah thank you! I like what I see

Looks like those were removed as well, what a tease! I am anxious to see what the bike shop/cafe looks like, sounds cool.

I really like your building, would you be willing to share how you built the parquet floor in the cupcake shop?

I have been tracking shipping costs and minus the two orders that I haven't been invoiced for I have paid a total of $56.64 in shipping charges and packing fees, including my PAB order. That come out to an average of $4.05 per order. Interestingly the most expense shipping charge was the PAB order which was pretty small. Cost of PAB parts was $36.10 and shipping /tax was $8.92, ouch.

I just received my first 2 BL orders. Only 67 pieces but it marks the beginning! I have another 11 BL orders that have shipped and 2 that have not yet been invoiced ( one of them is 127 lots so I figured it would take a while, the other I'm not sure what's going on as its only 12 lots). I also got a shipping notice regarding my PAB order. Unfortunately it also said that some items were back-ordered and that it was only a partial shipment. Total progress now - 443 parts, 18.42%

My first Modular building was the Fire Brigade, size of the box was not surprising to me as much as what that many parts looked like spread out over my table while building it. It took me 30 or 40 minutes just to organize the bricks for each bag # prior to construction! I moved a few months ago and had to rebuild all of them when I got into my new house. I was far lazier and didn't do any pre-sorting at all, but it brought back great memories of building that first one.

No problem, use whatever you like! Great suggestion on the cellphone tiles, I hadn't thought of those at all.

Well I am done for now. I moved the cash register on the coffee bar to the opposite side, just rebuilt it mirrored so it would fit against the wall. I placed all of the items that I built plus some chairs, a tiny table, a couple plants and 2 boxes full of toys as well. The space is just about maxed out so I don't think I will be adding the hanging rack that I had envisioned. I do want to get some 2 x 2 dark tan plates with the centered stud so I can fix the merchandise to the shelf. It's very delicate with almost everything just sitting on plates and it took a few tries to replace the floors into my layout without knocking everything off them. I took before and after pictures for effect Original 2nd floor: New 2nd floor: Original 3rd floor: New 3rd floor: I am very happy with the results, it feels a lot more 'grand' than it did before!

Alright, I spent quite a bit of time messing around with ways of doing some kind of hanging merchandise rack with zero success this evening so I moved on to the coffee bar. Customer view: Rear counter and espresso machine: Employee view: I'm going to try out a few ways for fitting the shelving, tables and coffee bar into the GE next. I'm thinking the coffee bar and 'adult' merchandise will go on the 2nd floor and toys plus something else (haven't figured out yet) on the third floor.

That may be the case, probably have to wait until you have 10 posts or so check this link to see his current work: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=90523#entry1785971

Click his name and the click the "topics" tab to see the threads he has authored. He speaks truth!

That's all-around fantastic, the letters are ridiculously cool!

I like this a lot, the interior and exterior are very well done! The inside corner is something I haven't seen before, it will make for a more interesting street layout for sure. I'm loving your alley and delivery entrance too - is that a sand green fish?!

Thanks lightningtiger, images fixed I was checking out your town the other day, you have some very cool interiors in those shops!

Hey all, So it's been about a year since I built my Grand Emporium... Similar to a lot of others I felt the 2nd and 3rd floors were rather spartan and decided that I would have to make some additions of my own. Low and behold, a whole year goes by and I had done nothing. Having just finished sorting out my spare parts I thought it would be a good time to start fiddling around with this. I did some web searching to see what other people had done (so much complaining about the lack of interior that I figured there must be a wealth of stuff online) and found surprisingly little so I decided to start a thread. I basically made a bunch of department store style display shelves. They are very simple but not bad for a first go with my limited supply of parts and colors. I also added a few bits that I threw together very quickly so they wouldn't look so plain. Low glass display case: Glass display case with shelving: Tiered shelf: Basic 2 level shelves: Small tables: A couple of other ideas I had: A display rack that merchandise can hang from. I'll have to experiment a little to find something suitable that will work. A coffee bar. I have seen several online that have given me ideas, just a matter of whether I have the parts to pull it off. If anyone has done this or has any input I would love to hear about it!

That looks great! I like that you swapped awning colors as well since you went with the blueish facade.

That is a very cool looking model! If you don't mind me asking, how long did it take you to design this is LDD?

How about a Tusken Raider with a medal They get such a bad rap surely they deserve some acknowledgement.

I really like the GE, it has a very classic urban look to it. Yes, it is very sparse on the inside but it is fun to personalize it and this set has the space inside to have a little fun with it. I started the modular series with FB and I was very anxious to get the GE - I think I bought it only a week later and it still occupies the most visible corner on my modular display. It's funny to see near the top of this page - when the GE was released and speculation about the next modular in the series began the first two guesses were a cinema and pet shop!

The most expensive pieces in this set are going to be: Sand green 1 x 8 bricks ($3.50 a piece - need 50) Sand green 1 x 2 brick w/ groove ($0.75-$1.25 a piece - need 56) Blue 1 x 3 x 2 bow ($3.50-$4.00 a piece - need 4) Tan minifig torso, part #4275334 ($3.50 and up - hard to find) Red Brown "Lady Wig", part #4506002 ($2.50 and up - Really hard to find) White Kitten w/ printed eyes, part #4285963 ($2.50 and up - hard to find) There are other parts that might be a little pricey but these are the ones I had a tougher time with. You can always substitute for something cheaper or more available depending on your personal preferences.