Lego celebrates May the Fourth with world's biggest Lego Millennium Falcon
This bucket of bricks may not be able to get past a blockade -- or even fly, at all -- but she's still got it where it counts.
In the lead-up to international "Star Wars" celebrations on May the Fourth, Lego master builders Dan Steininger and Chris Steininger spent two days overseeing an ambitious project: the creation of the world's biggest Millennium Falcon built entirely of Lego bricks.
Alongside Han Solo's iconic freighter, the father-son team also built two Imperial TIE fighters -- with help from visitors to the Westfield Southland mall in Melbourne, Australia. Visitors were invited to choose a side, the Galactic Empire or the Rebels, to determine with which project they would assist.
The Millennium Falcon is a real tour de force, measuring nearly 5 metres (16 feet) across, built from around 250,000 Lego bricks. The TIE Fighters are a little smaller, but nevertheless fabulous: each stands 2 metres high (6.6 feet) and is made of around 80,000 Lego bricks.
"Usually models the size of the Millennium Falcon can take more than a week to build, and it was thanks to the Aussie fans that we were able to build a model of this size in such a short time," Dan Steininger said.
"This model was ground-breaking for Lego because of the way it stretches out wide. Normally when we build big Lego builds they stand tall, so this was both an exciting and challenging experience for Chris and myself. It was very inspiring to see thousands of Melbournians come together, dress up, play and help build these iconic Star Wars vehicles -- we certainly couldn't have finished without them!"
The models will be on display at Westfield Southland until May 10. But if you don't have a hyperdrive to get there, you can check out a time lapse of the build in the video below.