Stacking Habitats: An Instagram AFOL Community Challenge

In our previous article “LEGO Community in the Time of Covid,” we mentioned that build challenges have become a popular and excellent way to connect with the global AFOL community. One such build challenge is the LEGO Minifigure Habitats Challenge hosted by @brickfambuilds on Instagram, which encourages builders to make habitats based on a given theme. Since our article was published last year, these challenges have only gotten bigger and better! In 2021, there were 2,605 habitats built by 330 participants all over the world.  

We sat down with Jen who runs @brickfambuilds to chat about her awesome build challenge and its effect on the AFOL Instagram community.

Inez: Hi Jen! Before we talk about the minifigure habitats, could you tell us something about yourself and your LEGO journey?

Jen: My LEGO journey is brief: My 6.5-year-old twins loved Duplo when they were small. So naturally when they were around 3 years old, my husband introduced LEGO into the mix. I’ve always built for them, but when the pandemic hit, my own interest took off and now here we are.

Jen’s habitat stack from the Disney Habitats Challenge.

Inez: What is the Mifigure Habitat Challenge? What inspired you to host such a challenge?

Jen: The habitat challenges are themed prompts to build an 8x8 based environment for a minifigure to inhabit in the habitat build scale. I was first inspired to host a habitat challenge back in October 2020 because Halloween was approaching and I wanted to combine my love of all things spooky and my recent obsession with habitat building. That first challenge was a 13-day countdown to Halloween and I had no idea if anyone would join beyond the accounts I had connected with through other monthly build challenges I had been participating in during the height of the pandemic.

Thankfully, each day more and more participants joined in and by the end, I could barely keep up with the posts; it was incredible! My family and I had so much fun seeing everyone’s interpretations of the prompt and there was such great feedback that I decided to host a holiday-themed one in December as well. The rest is history as they say; now I’m the habitat challenge lady. :)

Jen’s stack for the #mindthebrickhabitatchallenge cohosted with @brightonbricks

Inez: How does the challenge work?

Jen: Participants are asked to build at least one themed 8x8 based habitat during the challenge timeframe. Most build one for each day of the challenge and often, more than that. The challenge timeframes are typically 3 or 6 days, as 3 and 6 habitats stack optimally for the habitat stack day, which is the day following the challenge timeframe. On habitat stack day, participants stack and showcase their habitats from the challenge.  

You can see plenty of examples of stacks by checking out #legohabitatstack.

Jen provides instructions on how to build habitats every challenge. These instructions were for the recently concluded #ValentinesHabitats.

Inez: How often do you hold such challenges? How many have you had already?

Jen: Since October 2020 I’ve hosted 11 challenges. I try to space them out at least a month or so apart, with most occurring annually around a particular holiday or season.

Inez: It looks to me like you put in so much work running these challenges, from acknowledging every participant, to stitching together the daily collages, to building your own MOCs. How much time do you spend per challenge? Is this something you do on your own?

Jen: The challenges are definitely a time-consuming labor of love! Predominately I run them on my own, with my husband helping with administrative duties when time permits. When I have partnered with someone, they have helped with some of the duties as well. At this point, I have a whole system in place, but it definitely still consumes a large part of my day because the posts come in waves based on time zones and the challenges are open to participants worldwide. As a result, I endeavor to build all my habitats ahead of time so that I can focus all my energy on keeping track of and sharing the participant posts.

Inez: Your collages of all the participating habitats look awesome! What software do you use to stitch the photos together?

Jen: I use Photoshop Express.

The final collage from the Valentines Habitats challenge which had 205 habitats.

Inez: What's your favorite challenge? 

Jen: This one is so hard to answer! The Halloween one is very special to me because it was the first and is also my favorite holiday. Close seconds are the #LEGOCMFHabitats and #LEGODisneyHabitats challenges. I really enjoyed seeing everyone’s favorite characters showcased in their own unique build style.

Jen’s Halloween Habitats Stack from 2020 featuring 13 individual habitats.

Inez: What challenge has had the most participants so far? 

Jen: During the 2021 #HalloweenHabitats challenge there were 713 habitats built by 158 participants from 22 countries around the world. The challenge sponsors, @abcbuilds @emmettstoychest @mybrickbuild and I were absolutely blown away by the participation; the participants really took things to the next level with their creativity and added playability features.

Day 1 from the 2021 Halloween Habitats Challenge.

Inez: What is your favorite build so far? One you’ve made yourself and what challenge it was for.

Jen: You’re killing me! To make it easy on myself I’ll go with my Alice in Wonderland habitat from the #LEGODisneyHabitats challenge as it’s my most popular challenge habitat to date. It’s hard to pick my own personal favorite because they all have their own reason for being and I just have way too much fun building them all.

Jen’s favorite habitat build (for now!)

Inez: What do you like most about these challenges? Why do you do them?

Jen: What I like most about and why I host the challenges is that they foster creativity while encouraging and challenging builders of all skill levels community-wide. I love hearing at the end of a challenge that it inspired someone to venture outside of their comfort zone; whether it’s due to the size, the theme, or even to build and share a MOC to begin with. Venturing into the MOC world can be overwhelming and intimidating. The habitat scale offers a set of manageable parameters to work within but leaves the details up to the individual builder. That really levels the playing field for new and inexperienced builders.

I also cannot express how awesome it is to learn, share, and incorporate building techniques learned from each challenge. I’ve watched so many participants gain confidence and evolve and hone their building skills from challenge to challenge as a result of things they learned from other participants, myself included.

Inez: Could you invite our readers to your next habitat challenge?

Jen: The second annual #SpringHabitats challenge will take place in early April, but I’m still working on a date and details.

All the habitats stack from 2021’s Spring Habitats challenge.

Inez: Thanks again, Jen! Your challenge has introduced me to so many great builders, and I have definitely improved my skills through participating. I really enjoyed learning more about your Habitat Challenge and I’m in for the next one! Can’t wait for April!

Best of BrickNerd — Article originally published March 16, 2022.

Have you made a minifigure habitat yourself? Have you participated in these Habitat Challenges? Tell us about it in the comments below!

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