Report: Bricks Cascade 2020
Posted by MeganL,
With much of the world practising social distancing, it seems much longer than two weeks since I went to Bricks Cascade. As with all conventions I've attended, there was way too much to do in much too little time. Bricks Cascade also had the distinction of being the first convention that had a contingent of LEGO Masters contestants attending after the show had started to air. There were workshops, general sessions, and oh yes, there were over 1,000 MOCs on display as well.
I arrived on Thursday afternoon, in time to take a quick look around the venue, where some of the MOCs were being set up. That was no comparison to some of the AFOLs who participated much, much earlier on Thursday morning. A local TV station wanted to do a promo for Bricks Cascade for its morning show, and the crew was at the venue at 4:30 in the morning to interview the convention committee. Of course, there had to be MOCs in the background, so……Jeff Berquist, the man in charge of Bricks Cascade, recruited some locals to bring in their MOCs at that early hour. Talk about dedication!
On Friday, everything got started in earnest. There was an opening ceremony in the morning, followed by games and workshops for the rest of the day. Of course, there were MOCs to be set up - as mentioned earlier, over 1,000 of them! All them were in the running to win one of these awards:
Of course, there's an award included for the best brick built award.
After the opening ceremony, the next thing on my list to attend was the Women AFOLs (WAFOLS - pronounced "waffles") lunch. It was a great time, all the attendees received a "WAFOL" brick, and some even decorated their badge with a waffle piece. I think that's something that might catch on!
After lunch it was on to the Women's Brick Initiative (WBI) workshop. During the three hours, participants built a small hobbit hole, designed by Alice Finch, and learned how to implement lighting on the build.
Image by Will Nickelson
There was another station dedicated to jewellery making - this year's offerings were a charm necklace and a pair of earrings, using WBI accessories of a LEGO hammer, camera, and gem.
Image by Will Nickelson
A third station was dedicated to photography, where sets and backdrops were available to hone those skills.
Image by Alice Finch
DOTS were available at another station but I'll include those in an upcoming review.
After the workshop, there was finally some time to wander around and take a look at the many MOCs. These are just a few that caught my eye.
As mentioned in the article a couple of weeks ago, the WBI had their first collaborative build at Bricks Cascade. There is interest in having collaborative builds at future events.
One of the key attractions was the attendance of 10 LEGO Masters attendance. Sam, Jessica, Amie, Krystle, Mel, Corey, Flynn, Richard, and the local Oregon team of Boone and Mark were all onhand and interacted with fellow attendees. There were also meet and greets with all the contestants during the public hours, which were enormously successful. Lines were quite long and snaked through the display area, with some people waiting an hour or more in order to meet the contestants. This level of popularity was not expected by the organizers, though they adjusted well and fortunately the event space was large enough to accommodate the crowds.
There was a panel of all the contestants on Saturday, which I was able to attend and will write about in a future article.
Brickset friends Beyond the Brick were also in attendance to cover the event, and could be found just about everywhere.
And truly, they were found everywhere. I don't suppose there's any higher homage to be paid than to be presented as a MOC!
There were several areas for kids to play, including this Minecraft area.
On Saturday morning, there was a GayFOLs gathering followed by a lunch. Following the precedent set at Brickworld Chicago last year, the members of GayFOLs presented awards highlighting noteworthy builds.
The awards ceremony was held on Saturday night, but two of the most coveted awards weren't distributed until Sunday.
Ewok Adventure Land, a joint build by the Endor Build League, won the People's Choice Award. The Endor Build League was the work of several builders (Flynn DeMarco, Richard Board, Boone Langston, Mark Cruickshank, Samuel Hatmaker, and Perry Wang), including some LEGO Masters contestants.
Image by Will Nickelson
Painted City by Grant Davis was voted Best in Show by the attendees.
It was my first time at Bricks Cascade, and it won't be the last. It was an extremely well run event, and I was quite impressed by the organizers' ability to flex to changing conditions. The public event attracted more than 12,000 people, and while the venue was busy, it never felt too crushingly crowded, even with the very long lines to meet the LEGO Masters Contestants.
Putting on an event of this scale is no small amount of work, so much appreciation goes to Jeff Berquist, the head of the committee and the many members of the Bricks Cascade planning committee. I especially want to thank James and Kristina Ritzman, who were my main contacts for the event.
One of the great things about LEGO events is meeting friends that you've met at other events, and that was no exception here. Plus I made a bunch of whole new friends, who I hope I will see again at Bricks Cascade 2020.
With the current climate of cancelling events, I worry that Bricks Cascade was my first and last LEGO event of the year. If it was, then it was certainly a memorable one.
Everyone please stay safe and healthy. If there's any question as to what to do while house-bound, there's always LEGO to be built!
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14 comments on this article
It was a good con, glad it wasn't the weekend after or we woulda been shut down :P
I hope we get to see a closeup of the WAFOL brick!
Well I have the IDEAS Old Fishing Store to build.
Fantastic write up, thank you Megan!
Thanks for coming, Megan, and for the glowing review! I wish I could have spent some time with you; it all went by so fast! It being my local con, I was in host mode and “on” all weekend helping to make sure everyone was taken care of and having a good time. So glad to hear it was a great experience for you!
@_Kyle said:
" @MeganL Painted City was built as a collaboration by Grant Davis and Eli Willsea"
@_Kyle - The entry shown at Bricks Cascade 2020 was only the city background. Grant Davis was the sole credited builder, as neither of the other builders' contributions (the structures on the right and left that were shown in their official photos) were displayed.
I was gonna go.
Thanks @MeganL for the article and for joining us at Bricks Cascade! One correction, it was Lego Masters cast member Corey (not his brother Travis) who joined us.
Thank you so much @MeganL for the great write-up and we were immensely happy to have you at Bricks Cascade! We've been working very hard the past few years to improve the event year-over-year and the turnout exceeded our expectations. And also a big thanks to @Huw, hopefully we'll get to see him one of these years too...? ;)
^ I hope so too!
I went, and it was awesome!
Too bad that my friend's group's "Dispute on LV-4723" wasn't mentioned, it was fantastic!
@ragebomb - thanks for the correction, an example of thinking one thing while typing another...
@SeekerBear - there were so many great MOCs, it was hard to choose just a few pictures!
@ritzcrackerman - it's my goal to get @Huw to a show this side of the pond at some point!
@MeganL - There really were, it's awesome to see how creative people can be with LEGO.
@MeganL I enjoyed geeking out with you at the WBI workshop. Thanks for bringing the DOTS!