krimimimi

To add to @BrickMatit's reply, the new naming convention is to prefix the castle sets with "Hogwarts Castle", which both the Owlery and Boathouse do. Of the nine Harry Potter sets released in the winter 2024 wave, five of them are found / located on the Hogwarts' grounds. Those two Hogwarts Castle sets, and Hagrid's hut plus the two Forbidden forests sets (/ polybags). [Correction: all but the Owlery] of those five has the clips I mentioned earlier to permit you to connect them to each other. Based on the shapes, I wouldn't necessarily call the ones we've seen so far "modular" however. It feels like more of a storage / display aspect. On the other hand, the new Great Hall set is supposed to have removable rooms that can be swapped with others (like the Potions classroom), and that sounds very modular indeed.

It has the same 34816 Brick, Modified 1 x 2 with Bar Handle on End - Bar Flush with Edge and 60475 Brick, Modified 1 x 1 with Open O Clip (Vertical Grip) - Hollow Stud arrangement the other new sets from the winter 2024 wave have (as opposed to the technik pins from the 2021+ modular system), so I'd say yes, not that it matters. It's an easy and cheap thing to swap out and isn't attached to the castle at any rate. Hagrid's hut uses the clips to attach Draco's tree stump and the very miniature pumpkin patch to the main build.

@Lion KingHere's the link to the Polish article: https://fanklockow.pl/2024/03/11/zapowiedzi-lego-2024-harry-potter/ I'm just going to throw my defence of Grawp in the ring. I thought he was nicely done, although I certainly preferred the moulded Basilisk from CoS to the brick built atrocity from 2018's GH. It's a bit of a mixed bag when which approach is more appealing. I assume budgetary constraints dictate those choices often as not.

It's the same nine sets between DE and AU / Oz. https://www.lego.com/en-au/themes/harry-potter?filters.i0.key=variants.attributes.flags.key&filters.i0.values.i0=exclusive&filters.i0.values.i1=hardToFind

@Black Falcon, if you look on the lego S@H page and filter for either exclusiv or rare sets, or both, those are the sets you're less likely to find elsewhere, or if you do, they very likely will never be on sale. https://www.lego.com/de-de/themes/harry-potter?filters.i0.key=variants.attributes.flags.key&filters.i0.values.i0=exclusive&filters.i0.values.i1=hardToFind ("Filter", submenu "Empfohlen", "Exklusive Sets" & "Seltene Sets"). As you're in DE, Brickmerge also allows for you to filter for the rare sets. (https://www.brickmerge.de/LEGO-Harry Potter, Auswahl: selten / exclusiv). Here Müller seems to get some of the semi-exclusives. It used to be Toys-R-Us (which is now Smyths) who'd get them, but they don't seem to have the same arrangement anymore. @BacktoBricks, I'm not sure how good it is in the UK, but the shopping tab of a google search usually does alright as a price tracker goes (currently it's calling itself "products" for me, that might be a translation thing, though, because I know it used to be "shopping". Or they've rebranded, who knows.). It's pretty strictly geo-locked, however, so you can't check other countries.

@BacktoBricks There's a price tracking tool for Germany that allows you to also see what stores have offered a set at what prices for its entire run. DA was occasionally offered at other stores here, all told not a few, generally for more than lego charged, occasionally you'd see a "sale", the best of which I believe was 30 20 EUR below the S@H price, so generally nowhere even close to the discount you'd see from purchasing during a 2x VIP point sale or with a GWP. I assume Gringotts will be the same. eta: correction, the best discounts have only ever been 20 EUR, and very briefly at that. https://www.brickmerge.de/75978-1_lego-harry-potter-winkelgasse click "Preisentwicklung anzeigen" and then "alles anzeigen". I really like being able to look at what prices tend to do over time. It's definitely helped me decide more than once when to pull the trigger.

@Huigberts Builds, @JeanGreyForever, @Accio Lego I was still thinking about McGonagall's sleeves and saw this: https://www.picuki.com/media/3297529835406200828 So they could always use flippers... Dark green to match her dress. eta: sorry, I should have tagged @Seaber and not Accio Lego. Apparently I can't remember things one page to the next.

Next year might make more sense for a Yule Ball AC, so the exclusive or exclusive versions of the minifigs still serve as a draw for the Durmstrang / Beauxbatons set. It's basically what they did the last time, too (Clock Tower 2019 / YB AC 2020). But I'd bet you're right that they'll almost certainly do it eventually, and I think it's a good choice as themes go. As long as they don't cover too much of the same material (by which I mean the minifigs; they can knock themselves out with repeat buffet tables & co.), I'll happily buy it when the time comes. I wouldn't mind repeat Durmstrang minifigs with their cloaks, though. They were such standouts for me in the costuming. That overhead shot of them waltzing made the scene for me. (eta: https://theartofcostume.com/2020/12/23/designing-the-yule-ball-harry-potter-and-the-goblet-of-fire/ midway down that shot of them dancing 🥰; I'll also add that, in sharp contrast to the blogger, there aren't words to describe my loathing of Hermione's abomination of a dress) Some year I'd love to see a revisit of this year's AC, too, but with a different focus. Maybe the DA sign-ups? With Hogsmeade always snow covered, it's just such rich Xmas material. I think this AC was my favourite yet for what it offered.

BrickWarriors does a "wizard sleeve" that could conceivably work for McG, or they could go for a whole new arm mould. I'm sure they could get decent use out of it for the princesses, too. As for Snape, I thought the whole costuming gag was AR had weighed in and said the character only needed the one. Now I don't know if they meant that just for his classes and Alltag, and there's a different one for formalwear, or one absolutely. I'm not great at spotting those differences.

@BrickMatit, thank you! The thermometer is a good solution, it was very cute as a whole, and the unicorn was adorable. Even knowing what to look for, I was unable to make out the knife and fork, but they're a perfect solution. Or if they really feel parents would take offence, don't include them in the set, but put them in the next castle one. I imagine it's that or a flexi-straw.

I so want that set. 😆 Firenze seems like an obvious choice. How did they handle the unicorn scene in the HP video game? Because it seems like that would be considered an acceptable way to handle it here, too? For that matter, how was the Quirrellmort shade represented there? Given it's, what, a good 15 years on since the game's release, and the minifig design has really come such a long way in the meantime, how would people want to see the minifig represented? Would it be inappropriate to use the dementor / banshee swirled smoke lower body? And what do people think the chances are of them putting Fang in another set? C'mon, lego, stretch those mould Euros! (Please.)

2022 we definitely had descriptions. Remember the problems describing the angled sections of the Library in Dumbledore's Office? That was confusing, and we puzzled over it for quite some time. For 2023, I can remember the attempts to describe the vault sections of Gringotts. "it goes under..." Probably there were more, but those were the descriptions that immediately popped into mind.

I'm sceptical of the name as well as it means "our son". While some of the WW names have meaning, that one strikes me as weird. Nevertheless, it's a way of identifying it, so it's a start.

The modified Ivan portrait doesn't appear in the English version of the wiki, but here's the Spanish version https://harrypotter.fandom.com/es/wiki/Filius_Noster

I thought that was supposed to be five characters though? Also James Potter doesn't really appear in PoA. If anything, it's Black, Lupin and Snape meet Scabbers / Pettigrew. Which I guess is five right there. And we already have a Snape BHz. (Thanks @icm and @BrickMatit) Maybe Crooks instead?

@ArrowBricks, what's BHz?

@Balrogofmorgoth, , touché. Less so with the artwork, however. How many things are the same or only slightly edited? (Which, now that I type it, speaks again to your point...) But the minifig prints as a whole. There's far less diversity than the numbers might lead one to think. In as much as that leads to a visual language and style, that's not entirely a complaint on my part, however.

@mark1991t, 4 isn't it. That's a photographer's work that creates HP related art. (article here: https://www.therowlinglibrary.com/2019/05/19/wizarding-portraits-in-the-muggle-world-interview-with-xavier-boldu/) 12 probably won't be Merlin, because we were relatively sure he appeared on the Grand Staircase stickers, and I can't see them reinventing the wheel there when there's sufficient source material to choose from. see sticker here: https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=40577stk01&idColor=0#T=C&C=0 lower right, pic 18 Crack theory I'd like to run past you: 4 and 6 remind me of Sleeping Beauty (sans spindle) and Snow White, which if you steer clear of the Disney versions are clearly in the public domain. Both of them exist in the Wizarding World, because we have the stories of the hags that poisoned them (Draught of Living Death for Briar Rose). There was a suggestion that they may have been Muggles, as JKR's fairytale witches are depicted as more proactive, but the Wiggenweld potion worked to revive them. As potions typically fail on Muggles, one has to wonder if they weren't therefore also witches, and so perhaps the subjects of portraits...

@mark1991t, 7 is Edessa Sakndenberg and 9 is Damara Dodderidge

The stuff on the left looks blue/grey, but the stuff on the right looks green. So much for being able to tell what I am looking at even when I'm looking at it. Lighting matters. I think both roof colours work in the sets, with different strengths and weaknesses, and nostalgia in the 20th anniversary version certainly plays a legitimate role. An interesting aspect about the model: one of the things I like about the green roofs is that there is some contrast to the rocks below; in the model, it's the other way around, the roofs more grey and the rocks more green. Thanks for digging out the style guide, @Ferder. That's an excellent point.

As for them pantsing the Modular Hogwarts design, Fluffy Encounter and First Flying Lesson aren't even part of the Modular layout. They shouldn't be, as they were EOL by the time lego revealed their plans, but still, that hardly screams: we knew what we were doing all along! 😆 Thanks for lightening it, @Bricknificent. I'd agree it's a placeholder image, if only because of the knockoffs made in competition, but I'd expect locations and scale to be roughly accurate or they're setting themselves up for a World of Whinging. (Where's the Viaduct!!!!) Otherwise graphically you really need to go with a format that couldn't be taken for a hint of things to come. Or lots of disclaimers. (Maybe I need a closer look at that text at the bottom of that brochure... 😆) The base doesn't seem as "lego-y" as the castle, which I'm assuming is deliberate. Looking at the size, I'm wondering what marketable base sets for it would even look like. Does anyone know what the deepest underbuild has been to date? I know there was an older CoS during my dark years that I think a castle went on top of. The issue then becomes which rooms with the necessary depth make sense, if you wouldn't be able to remove them to play or clap them open for accessibility? If the thing is massive, it feels like this becomes a problem. Along those lines, what do we fancy the chances are that the Potions classroom isn't intended to flow into the large scale Hogwarts build? That it's simply a playset for the less minted 🤑 sold in parallel, sort of what the Moment sets were, except not as gimmicky?

Not a student, but Arthur appears in a chair for the Crimbo meal at 12 Grimmauld in OotP.

As to the castle, when I think of scenes in the castle not recently covered (and I'm going to express this badly, but scenes where for me it felt like the location was a real part of the story, almost a character in its own right: this is Hogwarts!, this only happens here), there are some that are particularly colourful that I'd like to see realised in sets. Some are story relevant, but another aspect is that they often have the magic that's at the root of what makes HP so special (again just for me, ymmv). In order of appearance... some version of the Staircase should be part of an official set, bonus points if the stairs move, or even better if a step can disappear beneath you the scene in PS with the troll on the loose in the dungeons! (with easily collapsed stall walls or sinks), so crucial, too, as it leads to the trio's friendship Halloween in the Great Hall, and I think I'd like to see them use a printed bit of plastic to reflect the night sky on the interior of the ceiling; that ceiling was so iconic, but they only ever seem to think about its exterior lukewarm on this one, but we'll need to revisit Herbology, even though I really don't need another Neville in his planting kit or baby mandrake, but we do need a better greenhouse; kindly include some more interesting planting, though (that Friends set shows they know how to do it when they care to); skip the students, give me plants! Lupin's class where the students conquer their fears with the Boggart, preferably any Boggart other than Neville's, though; I want the spider on skates (that I can repurpose in the Forbidden Forest) or the jack in the box. Also acceptable, Harry being taught to cast the Patronus a larger than 8 x [less than 8] representation of the Divination classroom and the tea leaf reading of the Grimm (give me a sticker for the teacup, please) the rampant jinxing that culminates in the deployment of the portable swamp, or the students running around in Bubblehead Charms the twins' Whizzbang-rich attack on Umbridge and flight from the school. Peeves' chasing the witch from the grounds with McGonagall's cane. (iirc, @Yope had done a MOC of the firework scene a few years back, for the 20th celebration, perhaps?) any class with Snape, the room itself was just so... atmospheric, but I also like that image of him examining the Cursed Necklace; magic isn't inherently safe there were all kinds of scenes from the Battle of Hogwarts, I haven't instantly got one that also feels like it would be kid safe or easily realised, but I'm sure I'll think of some later. (Aberforth with the Dementors...) @MaxHeadroom, fwiw, I really liked that BoH gave us the scene with Molly and Bellatrix (it's definitely one of the first things that comes to mind from the Battle) and quick!action!destruction plus some passable parts for the aqueduct for a larger Hogwarts build; it worked for me, especially when we already had the location for that particular duel in a different set. I loved that they didn't let that stop them. Give me more parts for more scenes from my checklists! w00t! and while we're at it: more of the magic casting magic wands! It's Hogwarts! Give us more Magic!! Yes, but somehow we are sorely lacking regular Death Eaters. I have an army of thousands (predominantly Harrys ) battling... a very small handful. Give me more!

I think the judge's hair would do the job: https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=11255&idColor=1#T=C&C=1 If they gave us that piece in grey for him, I wouldn't complain. It seems very much on par with the 2001 design, and the 2004 and 2007 sets had eleven and twelve stud interior measures, so this seems right in keeping. The 2019 version just really profited from the second room off to the side, like leaving 2001 or 2024 permanently clapped open.

Hey @Alas_Earwax, any chance there was a list of names of the portraits?