An anniversary and an au revoir

One of our rare 'admin' posts today to say, firstly, hey it's our birthday! Seven years since I started getting super-nerdy about new elements. Some 630 posts later (177 since our sixth birthday - that's a new post every other day on average), things have changed a bit! We are among the first Recognised LEGO Fan Media and now have a team of amazing writers and builders from around the world who create quality original content for you in their spare time, and of course we also have the brilliant models you all make for our contests and parts festivals, to inspire and educate the community.

Our various @newelementary social media channels continue to grow (22,000 on Instagram!... crazy) and increasingly are developing their own identities, sometimes their own original content too. And then of course we have 54 awesome people who support us on Patreon out of the goodness of their hearts, including our $12/month tier 'Vibrant Coral' patrons: Iain Adams, Sue Ann Barber & Trevor Clark, Kevin Gascoigne, David & Breda Fennell, Huw Millington, Beyond the Brick, Gerald Lasser, Neil Crosby, Antonio Serra, Big B Bricks, Dave Schefcik, London AFOLs, Geppy and Chris Cook. Thanks to them and all our magnificent patrons, everyone can enjoy New Elementary! So – thank YOU for reading. Because that is ultimately what we do it for.

It's not all sunshine and happiness as we enter our eighth year though as we are very sorry to announce that Elspeth De Montes is stepping down, to focus on her gorgeous family. I don't usually announce it when people leave us – even when it was as super-exciting as Sven Franic and Chris McVeigh getting jobs as LEGO designers! – but this moment must be marked. Elspeth has been an absolute rock and made such a massive impact on the site. She really lifted my spirits at a time when I may well have given up on it altogether and the fresh energy and clever ideas she brought has transformed the site. As much as I'll miss her here, I'm glad to say she's leaving for the very best of reasons. We still have some posts that she has written (or organised) to publish, plus she will still be around on her own awesome Instagram!

When lockdown began we posted a few links to New E articles from our archive to entertain you, so what better way to celebrate Elspeth, and the eighth year of New E, than to share eight of her greatest articles?

The new 'splat' gears inspired Elspeth to run through all the different kinds of gears throughout LEGO history

We ran a parts festival using Nexo Knights elements in Classic Space models – so Elspeth built household appliances, naturally

The LEGO elements still around today that were introduced for Fabuland

In her first review for New E she proposed attaching chicken legs and bicycles to flower stems. "She's a keeper," I thought

Elspeth just loooooves to collect a LEGO part in multiple colours and show them to you

The one with the Friends TV show characters compared to their minifigures

Is this new piece a plant or an animal? In Elspeth's hands, it is a neuron

Elspeth's take on the new Harry Potter wand inspired builders to hang on to their connecting sprues

And now, if you'll excuse her, Elspeth is off for some well-earned dark azure immersion. Bye honey.

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