Flower Pot Pals: Jonas Kramm's Pick a Brick project

The LEGO® Pick a Brick team challenged New Elementary to transform an ordinary set into something new with the help of some extra pieces from Pick a Brick online. Jonas Kramm stepped up by reimagining iconic LEGO® Botanicals set 10329 Tiny Plants as a series of Flower Pot Pals! Here's what he came up with – and you can try one for yourself by studying his breakdown.

Products in this article were gifted by The LEGO Group; the author's opinions are their own.
This article contains affiliate links to LEGO.com; we may get a small commission if you purchase.

Our thanks to LEGO Pick a Brick for the supply of the interesting and inspiring pieces Jonas chose from their wide selection online. We have included the IDs of the elements Jonas chose that could be of interest to you. Now, over to Jonas!

The idea

It all started with set 10329 Tiny Plants; already a classic of the LEGO Botanicals range and a wonderful display piece (read Thomas’ review of set 10329). I admired the shaping of the flowerpots, and wondered if they could become something else.

Their differing sizes makes them easy to stack, and this planted the seed in my head for a series of characters based upon the official set. One big pot became the head, and the middle-sized one the body when turned upside-down.

Only missing pairs of arms, legs and eyes, right?

Botanical Pot Characters

The round of introductions begins with a king and a knight. Both characters have facial hair, to give them unique expressions. 

King of the Pots

The King uses Plate Special 3 x 5 Cloud in Dark Green/ Green (6424110 | 35470) as his beard, which aligns nicely with a Rounded Plate 1 x 2 (6210271 | 35480) to attach the ball nose and to form a mouth. The eyebrows are made of claw pieces.

The idea to make this guy the king came from the blooming yellow flower on his head, which features an actual Princess Crown in Spring Yellowish Green/ Bright Yellowish Green (6435719 | 29171) inside.

Unique to the King is his flowing red robe with lush, drooping sleeves made of clam-shell elements (6468074 | 18970).

The shoes complete this regal outfit in Bright Bluish Green/ Dark Turquoise with a Ring in Warm Gold/ Pearl Gold (6286094 | 35485).

The Knight of the Round Bed

Each of my characters expands the standard base build in some way, and for the Knight I played around with different pot colours, ending up with a knight in armour.

The face combines the ball with two Tile Round 1 x 2 Half Circle in Black (6510071 | 1748) to make the perfect moustache. The forehead is built differently, as a frontal piece to the helmet, to make it more convincing. 

This pot is armed with a sword leaf and a shield made of various green Technic panels:

• Technic Panel Round Corner 5 x 3 x 2 Left (6498581 | 2438)
• Technic Panel Round Corner 5 x 3 x 2 Right (6498841 | 2442)
• Technic Panel Fairing Medium Triangle (6510080 | 2395)
• Technic Panel Fairing Small Smooth Long (6374073 | 64391)

Inspired by the headgear of a Centurion, the helmet is decorated with a comb of blossoms, which make use of Coiled Hair in Bright Reddish Violet/ Magenta (6450907 | 21778).

Pot-ler

What would happen if I used the smallest pot for one of these characters, I wondered? Behold, the Flower Pot Baby.

The head here is made of the middle-sized pot, which I planted with a young stem to reflect the age of the character. The stem uses the Technic Tooth / Bohrok Eyes in Bright Yellowish Green/ Lime (6322197 | 48267) as leaves. Also, Painters Palettes in Bright Green (6445437 | 93551, 65697) turn into cute feet.

Meadow Merchant

For the merchant, I let the plant grow a little longer to make it look like hair. The eyebrows are mohawks in Bright Yellowish Green/ Lime (6474483 | 3758), which are quite an interesting element, especially in this colour.

The green spines are connected via an Earth Green/ Dark Green Steering Wheel (6329283 | 67811) inside the pot.

The girl wears a dress, which uses Medium Lilac/ Dark Purple Windscreens, a piece I had to pluck from my collection as it came only in the LEGO® Elves theme a while ago now. The vendor tray is clipped to the tummy and filled with a berry and a mushroom made with a printed dish in Magenta (6480467), which was available on Pick a Brick when I ordered, but sadly has since disappeared. 

How to build your Flower Pot Pal

If you have a copy of 10329 Tiny Plants and would like to build your own little character, you are more than welcome to try your hand at it! 

• For the head, you just follow the official Tiny Plants building instructions for the big pot.
• Then replace one of the angled surfaces with a 4x4 plate containing your face design.
• For the two arms: all limbs are based on the 'maxaroni' (either of the 65473 or 5489 mould variant is fine), and for the hands I went with Brick Curved Corner (67810), connecting the two using an inverted 1x2 bow (24201), a curved brick 1x2x1⅓ (6091 & 32807),  a 1x1 Technic brick and of course the necessary Technic connectors, which will include the towball with axle (2736) to connect the arm to the body. 

Now for the legs.

• The legs use two more maxaroni and two half-bushings (32123, 42136), joined by one Technic connector with right-angled axles (10197).
• The shoes are a 1x2 Technic brick with 1 hole (3700), a 1x2 plate and a 1x2 curved brick (37352).

The body is a bit more complicated, as this pot is upside-down. I based it upon the official medium-sized pot, but it has a different core cube, with connections for the head and arms. 

• For the core cube, you need different bricks to those in the set. Make two layers of SNOT bricks separated by two layers of plate, as seen above. One of those layers of plate needs a ball socket (14704) on either side to connect the arms.
• Add another layer of plate on top, then a layer of tiles, and in the middle a 2x2 turntable (27448) to connect the head.
• (I'll explain the sideways reddish brown element with 1x2 nougat plate in a moment.)

• From the official instructions, build as normal the pair of side panels that use 1x2 rail plates, and attach them to the sides that don't have ball sockets – keeping the rail sides on the lower half; remember our pot is upside-down. 
• While those panels were the same as the instructions, the other pair needs to be adapted. Rather than attaching the 2x2 tile with 2 studs to the reddish brown piece, use a regular 1x2 plate. Add the two 2x2 curved slopes (15068), or two 1x4 curved slopes (93273) as I did above in grey. These panels are ready to be attached below the ball socket.
• Apply 1x2 cheese slopes (85984, 83473) either side of the ball socket as shown above.
• For the remaining exposed studs above the ball socket, use the now-spare 2x2 tile with 2 studs. Add left and right 1x2 curved wedge slopes (29119 and 29120) as shown above.
• You can now attach the 3x3 macaroni tiles (79393) in the same way as in the official instructions, but upside-down of course.
• To connect the body to the legs, use a black Technic connector with 1x2 plate (32529),

Your base Flower Pot Pal is now complete!

You can then go wild like I did with the plants and colours in your Flower Pot Pal, and adapt sections of the body in unique ways to suit their character.

Please share your characters with us on social media using the hashtag #FlowerPotPals!

Tiny Plants on LEGO.com

 

 

READ MORE: Tom Loftus' Fractal 45 spaceship MOC

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