Review: 41108 Heartlake Food Market
Posted by Huw,
Guest reviewer MeganL takes a look at another of the Summer Friends releases, 41108 Heartlake Food Market:
I was happy to see the Food Market in the Friends world as it represented a store that wasn’t a beauty parlour or something that involved serving food (granted, it’s buying food, but I counted it as a difference).
The box is the typical Friends packaging, with the front of the box showing the overall set and the back of the box showing various details. I didn’t take a close look at the back of the box when I bought the set, so I was pleasantly surprised during the build to find the second floor of the market including the efficiency apartment.
Inside the box there are three bags, two baseplates (one larger, one smaller), two instruction booklets, and one unfortunately crumpled sticker sheet, which is being flattened by being placed between the two baseplates in the picture.
The Mini dolls are Mia and her friend Maya. Mia is in a fuschia top and green shorts with fuschia design, and Maya with a check shirt and fuchsia skirt. A rather adorable kitty completes the trio with a handbasket and a helmet for other accessories. The helmet does not go on over the hair but looks very cute on regardless. Next is the motorscooter in a nice blue colour with a basket in the back for deliveries. It’s a tight fit but Mia can fit.
An outside crate for bananas, a price easel and a rather colourful bench with lamp post comes next.
The first bag is mostly setting up the walls, floor and windows in the first floor. The building technique is relatively unremarkable with a few stickers that add to the build. There is a small lav built in the first floor as well; it’s the only detail in the first bag. The windows in the shop are the lovely big plate glass window tiles, of which I’m a huge fan – I love having big windows in the shops. Even though the wall pieces are convenient, I have to admit that it almost feels a little like cheating when using them in the build. (Pictures of front and back views of the build after the first bag).
The top of the first floor is set so you can lift off the second floor; it’s one of those features I’ve always liked about LEGO buildings.
Much of the second bag is dedicated to outfitting the details outside and in the main shop. Outside details include crates for bread, carrots and flower pots. Inside, I particularly like the display case with the jars with the very cute strawberry lids. It’s a shame that they’re on the bottom row instead of the top, or even that they’re covered by the rest of the case at all. Next is a display for orange juice and milk, then the addition of apples, pineapples and cherries. (Pictures of lids, and displays inside the shop).
The third bag is dedicated to outfitting the small efficiency apartment on the second floor including a kitchenette with lots of little details. At this point it feels like some of the stickers are getting gratuitous, particularly the tall floral design next to the door.
I liked the windows on the second floor with both the windows and blinds opening outward. The finishing touches for the second floor are the settee, table (including a cake with a cherry on top) and a laptop computer. A ladder provides access to the roof top with a day bed.
Overall thoughts
In some ways to me, this felt like a mini-modular, with the food market on the first floor, and the small apartment up top. I really like how in many Friends models there are a lot of little extras, or in this case, big extras, like the extra second floor. When I saw “food market” I expected just the market, but having the second floor really expands the play possibilities in the set and adds lots more features.
For the price ($39.99) it seems suitably priced, especially with all the details in the market itself – both inside and outside – and the second floor efficiency. I’d love to see more of these kinds of sets to build more of a Heartlake downtown street to add to stores such as the juice bar and the bakery. Similarly, I think I could see this food market in a City environment.
My one small gripe with this set are the stickers. While I understand the need for some of them – the signpost, the cash register, the price board – there are some that just felt unnecessary, such as the tall floral pattern outside the apartment door and the sticker for the laptop computer.
Another plus for me is that there is no overwhelming pink theme in this set. Perhaps it is just the subset of experts (read: parents of girls) that I talk to, but their experience is similar in that their daughters don’t like the Friends sets because there is such an overwhelming amount of pink. I’ve been able to recommend both this set and the skate park for those non-pink fans.
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14 comments on this article
I had to look up what an 'efficiency apartment' was, but nice review nonetheless. Thanks.
Me too. We call them 'bedsits' :)
Hi,
very nice review MeganL! Keep it coming!
This is a challenge that I really would like to see folks complete. Scroll through Brickset's Friends theme pictures, and please tell me which Friends set "overwhelming" features pink.
"Pink" really only jumps out at me as predominant in Sunshine Ranch, Pop Star Tour Bus, and Olivia's House and that is the deep pink color (magenta? I'm not good with naming colors). The two pink stripes do stand out on the Heartlake Lighthouse, but stand next to a building in two shades of blue. The pink on Poodle's Little Palace did stand out me and that's twelve out of forty-six pieces.
I'd list the sets that I'd didn't notice any pink, but I'm not typing the names of thirty-six sets. I'm not saying that these sets didn't have pink, but I didn't notice it as standing out in the sets therefore I don't think that in these sets pink is "overwhelming".
I sorted my Friends bricks by color (This would have been all of the sets minus the Summer 2015 wave and animal foil bags). I had a huge brown and tan box, a huge white box, a small yellow and orange box, a small green box, and a small grey and black box. The pink (in all it's many Heartlake shades), red, and purple piece collections where so small, I fit them all together in medium box.
I really wish I had the time to spreadsheet all of the brick counts by color in Friends' sets to offer solid proof that pink is in low representation, but again I really don't have time and folks would find ways to still say there's too much pink.
TLG has really done a fair job of mingling a rainbow of colors--few pastels with many bolds--into the predominantly tan and white Friends sets. Folks seem to have applied the stereotype that "girls toys are pink and Friends LEGO set are girls' building sets so they must be pink too" without really looking at the sets as a whole, but instead looking for what they want too see.
Looks like a nice set.
The ones from this wave that stand out to me, are the planes. I want them both!
Also, my daughter, who loves pink, would say there isn't enough of it in the friends sets. Lol
Honestly there is just as much purple and blue as pink.
I agree with the others about Friends sets having way less pink pieces than they are constantly criticized for. Having said that, as the dad of a four year old girl, the more pink the better as far as I'm concerned because I absolutely love that color in Lego. My daughter loves Superheroes and Star Wars Lego just as much as Friends, Elves and Princesses so I find it ridiculous when people somehow seem to think that girls can't enjoy any Lego set just as much as boys. That said, she also loves the giant 30" x 30" pink castle and three foot tall lavender and purple Rapunzel's tower I built her. I hope society doesn't collapse around our ears due to my gender stereotyping.
Boys and girls are different. That should be no more denied than it should be enforced. And no one is forcing girls to buy pink Lego.
Nice pink analysis, @erikjohn. I agree. Maybe lavender is the new pink?
I'm generally more a fan of magenta than of lighter pinks (my three-year old daughter loves any shade of pink and knows quite a few purple words), but in defense of the pink lighthouse, well, I just love it. Perfectly beyond the pale...
Five or ten years back, Print Magazine had a piece on pink which claimed that prior to the 1930s (or was it the 1920s?) the pink for girls/blue for boys paradigm wasn't so dominant. In fact (or so the article claimed), red was manly virility, so boys should be dressed in a lighter shade of the same...
@ericjohn and others - you have a really good point. When I look at a lot of the Friends sets, the predominant colour isn't pink. However, some of them do - when I was writing that, I was thinking of the Sunshine Ranch and the Lighthouse, among others. Some of my favourite Friends sets are the Jungle theme ones. When I looked at the Rescue Base, I thought of it as pink, even though it's just the roof pieces that gives me that impression. The Bridge Rescue doesn't have many pink pieces at all.
When I was talking to a coworker about this, he was telling me that they have bought Friends sets for their daughter and ended up taking them back because they were "too pink". You could blame the package, but that's predominantly purple. So perhaps we're talking about people's preconceived notions (including my own).
I will get it tommorow and I want it to mix it with Juniors Supermarfket for small friendly shop.
In my eyes its a great set (especialy for CITY fans), but for some reason the upper floor looks unfinished and boring in front.
Yeah, I have the Jungle Bridge Rescue, which doesn't seem very pink. The vehicles are pastel purple and lime green mixed with white, though. And that's not pink, but it looks pretty bad in my eyes next to a very nicely done bridge.
I don't actually like this food market very much. It's a sticker-covered façade of a building that needs more figures and doesn't actually have real walls, unlike most open-backed LEGO buildings that pull it off well, the only decent-looking side of the building is a 3/4 view that makes the lack of real walls very conspicuous, there are no play functions whatsoever, and tan/lime green/whichever pink shade is getting really old. I very much like the aqua moped and the food bits, and I do admire that interior. But I wouldn't enjoy this set. I know I'm not the audience, blah blah blah, but that skate park is honestly much better at being simultaneously fun to play with, colorful, and complete.
Great review. Can't wait to pick this set up and modularize it!
Agreed on the annoyance of the many stickers in Friends sets. I think a bit more articulation on them - how many there are, a photo of the set without the stickers applied, etc - would be fantastic in reviews. Those of us who consider personal customization potential of sets would certainly love that kind of insight.
Friends sets in general have pink, magenta and purples as a common theme, with pastels more common than other sets. I think that it is this sense that things have been done in slightly jarring, unrealistic colours, just to make them "girls" sets, that people find annoying. While not technically too much pink, it is it's use in places that would never be that colour in the real world that presses peoples buttons. Good review, and keep them coming.
Sounds like a wonderful set for everyone, especially the boys and girls who like to play kitchen with play stoves, fridges and tables and play food. And they love play shopping for food as they get to do that a lot in real life. Maybe we can help little guys feel more comfortable in the kitchen. Way to go LEGO!
I'm a guy and I love the Friends line. The parts go well with any MOC and they are well designed. Cost wise, they better not ever approach that 1c per brick though. Lots of small parts, and I tend to think LEGO in general has really raised prices per pound of plastic, while decreasing the price per brick. Not cool. Off topic though.
The Heartlake Skate Park is just as "manly" as any set, just it's orange, which if you notice, is a much more popular color with kids these days (sports people like Rickey Fowler and others wearing orange more).