Interview with Chris Stamp, Speed Champions Design Manager - Part 1
Posted by CapnRex101,
Speed Champions remains among the most consistently impressive LEGO themes, featuring unusual construction techniques and seemingly improving with each new wave.
Chris Stamp, Design Manager for Speed Champions, has kindly answered our questions about the range, starting with how vehicles are selected and the reducing reliance upon stickers in recent sets.
Brickset: Speed Champions underwent a dramatic change just over two years ago, which is perhaps long enough to judge whether the updated scale has been successful. Has the theme become more popular?
Chris: Absolutely. The enlarged scale has allowed us to develop a new strategy, which essentially is to forget the age on the box! We want to offer unique building experiences that educate younger builders and are appreciated by older builders simultaneously. That is how we approach each model because there is no age limit on being a car enthusiast, so we can cover older and modern subjects. We focus exclusively on vehicle fans, of any age.
Also, the small size of Speed Champions cars does not mean they must be easy to build. We have seen the range described as ‘mini Creator Expert’ and that is honestly how we approach every set. We include as much detail as possible and always target the utmost accuracy, hopefully giving people a Creator Expert or 18+ experience, at a much lower price point than those themes. Something I have observed is the different fan expectation and reception for larger models, like Modular Buildings or UCS sets, relative to smaller models. My goal is always narrowing the gap between those sets of different scales and conveying the same experience as much larger sets, at a tenth of the size.
Of course, that means the cars become much more accurate and satisfy particular fans of those cars, while maintaining the play value inherent to vehicles. We target adults in the hope that they will think the models are exciting, in which case teenagers and children should find Speed Champions cool as well. That inverts the normal LEGO process in some respects because children are the main audience, but we are prioritising anyone passionate about cars.
Aiming for older fans does create challenges though, especially concerning the building experiences. Fundamentally, the cars are all constructed around similar chassis and four wheels, which could easily become very repetitive. One of the goals I push the designers towards is differentiating the models and giving every design a unique building experience. There are bound to be similarities, but getting the exact details as accurate as we can ensures different experiences across the range. Using parts in interesting and unusual ways is paramount in achieving that, with meat cleavers, NEXO Knights axes and all sorts of obscure elements becoming details on cars!
This sounds strange, but the process of targeting adults and the appeal trickling down to everyone reminds me of Pixar.
I can see that comparison and the Marvel Cinematic Universe too, actually. The comparison extends to Marvel movies sometimes being perceived as formulaic, whereas I think they are pretty different while maintaining the same qualities. Speed Champions could easily become formulaic, but we aim to continue evolving while also applying our past successes to new products. Creating new car types and manufacturers helps with continued variety too. I have seen demand for Formula 1 cars from different teams, for example, but that would mean prioritising the IP, rather than the building experience.
I suppose that would be easy if there were infinite product slots available, but there are not.
Absolutely. We could produce Formula 1 cars in several different colours, but the only real variation between them would be the stickers. I think people would quickly become bored with them, though having an entire grid might be nice.
When choosing cars to recreate for Speed Champions, how important are very distinctive features, such as the radiator grille on the Aston Martin Vantage, or numerous aspects of the Countach?
We never want to select cars which are too generic. There is often discussion online about releasing more ‘normal’ cars, but that is probably only something we would consider if the theme was larger and could accommodate more sets. At the moment, we need to focus on genuine icons, from any era. Also, more generic cars may result in an unremarkable building experience, so anything with a quirky detail is preferred. Those quirky details create inevitable differences from other models too.
So, to answer your question, we always seek out cool and interesting details on cars and think about different brands whenever possible. I took on the design manager role for the 2019 wave and the theme has featured new brands every year since. The Koenigsegg Jesko is a great example because we knew that would be perfect for Speed Champions as soon as we saw the spoiler. That combined the factors of a new brand and a distinctive feature which makes for an ideal subject.
The tail lights on the Lotus Evija are another such feature. We have received many requests for Lotus in Speed Champions before, focusing particularly on classic Formula 1 cars. However, the new Evija appeared completely perfect for the theme, in large part because of those tail lights. No other car that I have seen includes lights like those, so they distinguish the LEGO model from anything else we have done in Speed Champions. I think they have the potential to become iconic with time.
Beyond the change in scale, I think Speed Champions is also less reliant upon stickers than it was in the past, instead involving more complex construction. Do you actively seek to avoid stickers during development?
I would not say we are seeking to avoid stickers, but we do want to build as much as we can. Taking the Aston Martin Vantage as an example, the original car features side exhausts. We did work out how to build that detail using various wacky methods. However, the building experience became wildly complicated. As mentioned already, we are not averse to advanced techniques, but there is a point when the experience could shift from challenging to frustrating. Internal guidelines for design must obviously be considered too, as the models must remain stable during play.
Having said that, we recognise that some people dislike stickers and rarely apply them. With that in mind, we have discussed which details were absolutely necessary to a successful Speed Champions car. The four wheels, windscreen, lights, and roof are paramount. We have become pretty good at building tail lights, but the headlights were always more problematic because of their strange angles and shapes, making them difficult to build. That prompted the introduction of the printed headlights this year, so the most important features are present, even if you choose not to apply any stickers.
Thank you for speaking with us.
Part two will be published tomorrow, discussing printing issues and why Speed Champions minifigures feature a yellow skin tone, among other topics.
122 likes
23 comments on this article
First thought when seeing a b/w portrait: Who's dead now?
I guess media conventions messed me up =(
Not the first interview With Chris Stamp I've read, but some new insights into the theme. I always find him one of the most forthcoming staff of Lego's design teams.
Great interview! The ethos of appealing to car lovers of every age is an excellent one to follow, and I am so glad that LEGO OK’d what must have required a massive amount of work internally to change the line from 6 to 8 wide. It’s been a wonderful change, the cars look better, and I went from buying maybe 1 SC set a year to basically picking up the whole new wave earlier this month. I am still eyeing getting the Jesko and Chevy pack from last year.
I hear what he says about F1 cars being repetitive building experiences - But I have hope we’ll still see some next year, thanks to the wildly different designs between cars this season.
Come on, we all know Ferrari’s bulbous sidepods this year are exactly the kind of “quirky detail” that he’s talking about. ;)
Love the interviews!
I can’t wait to read part 2 :)
I think I've mentioned it in a few Speed Champions reviews I've done, but I always feel like they offer the best value for money if you're looking for interesting building techniques. It's great to see that's a conscious decision on the part of the designers.
Looking forward to reading part two!
Terrific interview! I had just bought 76907 Lotus Evija at a store 15 minutes before seeing this article here. LOL. Great timing. I'm excited about building the tail lights Mr. Stamp talked about.
Great interview! Appreciate his willingness to provide honest answers. I wish all Design Managers would be as forthcoming. I think Speed Champions is a theme on an upswing in popularity, and I look forward to reading part two tomorrow!
Great interview, and insight behind the scenes. I understand their hesitation, but I don't think TLG need to be cautious about expanding the theme. It's the perfect subject matter for brick built toys. There are room for "boring" builds, if the car is popular, and there are room for innovative builds, even if the car is less popular.
Do we feel like the 8-wide Speed Champions are in scale with the Modular Buildings? I can't really decide but I'm leaning towards "they're too big".
Great interview. I like the direction that Chris is taking the theme. I would like to thank him for the awesome Countach as well as the Huracan Super Trofeo. They are my absolute favorites of my SC collection.
He looks like a happy lucky guy. Good interview and always good, interesting to hear from the other side of our beloved Lego sets.
@CopperTablet said:
"Do we feel like the 8-wide Speed Champions are in scale with the Modular Buildings? I can't really decide but I'm leaning towards "they're too big". "
To me, it's a matter of reading between the lines to see that scaling the cars to work with city layouts or other sets has lost priority in the SC theme. There has obviously been a conscious shift to the 8-wide scale to improve the level of detail on the cars and still look ok with minifig drivers, if just barely.
I think the internal principle has become something along the lines of "if we can appeal to more fans with more accurate cars at the cost of layout versatility, let's make the switch and rely on city and creator to provide vehicles more in scale with minifig structures."
I have all the 8 wide collection. Each one has elements that provided super cool innovative techniques. I will continue to collect these as they come out. They each are different enough that it has yet to get old for me.
Since I just got back into Lego back in October I can say that I would have had very little interest in the six wide format, I don't have room for a city, and I think the majority of people also don't have giant elaborate modular cities. That said six wide were to blocky and cartoon looking. These new ones look the part and I am so glad to be back into Lego at this moment in time.
Awesome interview.
@CopperTablet said:
"Do we feel like the 8-wide Speed Champions are in scale with the Modular Buildings? I can't really decide but I'm leaning towards "they're too big". "
I feel like the Speed Champions line is trying to be accurate scale models of real life cars, with human proportions. I like that. Whereas modular buildings are designed for minifig proportions, but with realistic looking architectural detailing. Which is also great, just a different thing.
They both try to look realistic, and be compatible with minifigs. But, they are not meant to be compatible in terms of proportions, even if the scale is somewhat similar. Overall, I guess you could say that the cars are too big for the buildings, because minifigs are extremely short compared to humans in terms of proportions.
@RTS013 said:
" @CopperTablet said:
"Do we feel like the 8-wide Speed Champions are in scale with the Modular Buildings? I can't really decide but I'm leaning towards "they're too big". "
I feel like the Speed Champions line is trying to be accurate scale models of real life cars, with human proportions. I like that. Whereas modular buildings are designed for minifig proportions, but with realistic looking architectural detailing. Which is also great, just a different thing.
They both try to look realistic, and be compatible with minifigs. But, they are not meant to be compatible in terms of proportions, even if the scale is somewhat similar. Overall, I guess you could say that the cars are too big for the buildings, because minifigs are extremely short compared to humans in terms of proportions."
Agreed. The people who are upset about the move from 6 wide are the ones playing with them. There are plenty of City theme cars for them to play with. They also claim them to be a better scale to minifig yet how many mustangs you know that can seat only one person? IMO TLG is doing exactly what they should be doing and luckily the numbers only back up this opinion.
Bottom line SC is a theme that is meant to be in the SC world alone and in this sense the scale is by default exactly where it should be. You keep the length x width x height of the cars at the proper ratio and you literally can not be wrong. What was gained for the ones into the SC theme itself far outweighs the want for more means of transportation for those playing with their minifigs only because there is plenty of this to choose from as it is already. Always has been.........
This is great, thank you.
SC is in my top level of themes. I’m hungry for info and product for it and this content supremely satisfies!
I was surprised to hear the comment about F1 cars being of the same shape. I have exactly the opposite feeling. Whereas rally cars and sports cars generally follow similar design rules with minor variations, F1 cars can differ radicaly already on the level of basic layout. Think Alpha Romeo 159, Lancia D50, Lotus 25, Lotus 72, Brabham BT44, Ferrari 312, McLaren M23, Tyrrell P34, Lotus 79, etc, bringing also a wide variety of color. One could literally fill the whole Speed Champions line with F1 cars for years without repeating the build sequence. As of now, just one historical F1 would be very much appreciated, pretty please.
All of this makes one thing perfectly clear in my head…which is that I can continue to make my own 6-wide cars. I don’t have to worry about meeting their playability standards, so I can pack more detail (and more seats!) into a much smaller package, and they’ll actually look good in my LUG’s displays.
@CopperTablet:
They’re not. In a previous interview, someone from the SC design team made it perfectly clear that they don’t care about that because they consider SC to be an independent theme, rather than an extension of City. There are only a handful of vehicles I’ve built to 8-wide for use in my LUG’s displays. These include Lightning McQueen and Holley Shiftwell from Pixar’s Cars franchise, because it turns out they actually are noticeably wider than any of the other Cars characters I’d modeled in 6-wide. I also made my Routemaster 8-wide, which allows seating on both sides of a center aisle. And I’ve got box trucks with 6-wide cabs and 8-wide cargo boxes because if you look at a real one, the cargo box is about 2’ wider than the cab in most cases.
@Galaxy12_Import:
From the earlier interview, I got the impression that they never really intended SC as a supplement to City, but probably started out with 6-wide designs because that’s what had been working best with other themes at that point. Besides City, DC and Marvel have done 6-wide, and I doubt either of those design teams consider themselves to be sub-themes of City. The distinction is that DC and Marvel are still focused on minifigs based on superhero characters, where SC is all about the cars with minifigs as something of an afterthought.
@deejdave:
That’s a grossly uninformed assumption. I design my MOCs strictly for display, but with a focus on minifig compatibility. My LUG usually does over 20 displays annually, and I’ve done as many as 15 of them. My cars stay packed up in travel cases between shows, and just sit on a layout during shows. Meanwhile, kids have been playing with 10-wide, 12-wide, and in the case of the first Tumbler, even 18-wide without any issues. 8-wide is nothing to them, but it’s badly scaled to anything AFOLs might put in a home layout.
Many of the members of my LUG have home layouts, and I don’t know of anyone who builds 8-wide cars. Most go 6-wide, but a few even stick to dinky little 4-wides.
@CopperTablet said:
"Do we feel like the 8-wide Speed Champions are in scale with the Modular Buildings? I can't really decide but I'm leaning towards "they're too big". "
Yes they are way too big. They look very oversized on both the new and old roadplates and when you park them outside a modular building.
Personally I think moving to 8 wide was the worst thing Lego ever did with Speed Champions. I know 8 wide allows for more detail, but its not as though the 6 wide cars were undetailed, far from it, and 6 wide offered more challenges to be solved (which is usually a good thing).
Most Lego fans have a display of some sort, maybe not a huge Lego City, but often a small street display on a shelf or things like that. 6 wide meant that SC cars were compatible with these displays. Sadly this is no longer the case and Lego has basically limited themselves completely to display models only that just sit in a row on a shelf, which isn't something kids usually want to do.
I collect Matchbox Models of Yesteryear cars, and for most of the year they are in a display cabinet in rows like I describe above. But I love getting them out at Christmas to populate my Winter Village (I have little houses made of resin and crockery). People can, and do, appreciate my cars more when they are on display in a diorama, and the same goes for Lego cars.
Thankfully I don't miss out much as Lego only does modern supercars or post 1960s race cars, which I have no interest in. I want to see pre 1960s cars, both racing and regular cars, and by restricting themselves to 8 wide, Lego therefore renders models like the Bugatti 35 (which should really only be four wide, 5 at most), unable to work with the theme, which is a real shame.
@pHcz said:
"I was surprised to hear the comment about F1 cars being of the same shape. I have exactly the opposite feeling. Whereas rally cars and sports cars generally follow similar design rules with minor variations, F1 cars can differ radicaly already on the level of basic layout. Think Alpha Romeo 159, Lancia D50, Lotus 25, Lotus 72, Brabham BT44, Ferrari 312, McLaren M23, Tyrrell P34, Lotus 79, etc, bringing also a wide variety of color. One could literally fill the whole Speed Champions line with F1 cars for years without repeating the build sequence. As of now, just one historical F1 would be very much appreciated, pretty please.
"
I got the impression he was thinking about present F1 cars, from the last few years or so, as he mentioned "having an entire grid". In Lego-rendition those would be very similar, except the colors and stickers. But as you say, looking at historic cars, there is a huge potential for variation!
Good article. I personally like the scale. I appreciate their limits as you can have too much of of a good thing(they'd send us all broke). Not a fan of stickers though. Countach, love it. The wheels....Uggggh!!!!
Printed or slotted, Please.
@DavisCam said:
"Good article. I personally like the scale. I appreciate their limits as you can have too much of of a good thing(they'd send us all broke). Not a fan of stickers though. Countach, love it. The wheels....Uggggh!!!!
Printed or slotted, Please."
The wheel caps on the Countach are printed.