Celebrating a Mardi Gras Parade
As part of the model refresh for our Brick City tour, we wanted to include a celebration piece where we could really go all-out with minifigs having fun. And what better chance for that than a Mardi Gras Parade, where we not only get to enjoy floats, costumes and paradees, but we could also showcase some of the beautiful architecture and ornate balconies of the French Quarter of New Orleans?
We took loads of inspiration from websites and write-ups of the parades and tried to capture the spirit of the festival with its signature colours, types of parade floats along with their krewes and all the other paradees who dress up; musical acts; who play; watchers and other groups of family and friends all enjoying the day.
King of the Parade with his attendants in his golden float, leading the Mardi Gras Parade
As with many parades, ours is headed up by the King of the Parade. We couldn’t resist creating him an all-gold throne float and really enjoyed finding the best minifigure parts for him and his attendants to be suitably blinged for their chariot.
Aerial shot of Mardi Gras parade showing Octopus float and surrounding people
Floats with themes around the sea and Neptune as its King are also a common feature of many parades. Our octopus’s body is made form the elements first introduced in the LEGO Friends theme to make hot air balloons. Thrown in some mermaids, and decorate the rest of the float with coral, starfish, seahorses and shells and you’ve got a watery paradise.
When we saw images of this guy we knew we had to include him! Who doesn’t love a wine-dispensing dinosaur, steered by a faun and krewed by wand-waving butterflies?
This model can be displayed in-the-round , so we wanted to make sure there were lots of little stories happening all across the scene. There are Stormtroopers in suits, conga-ing with some navy sailors; family groups, a hen party as well as lots of nods to current and historic LEGO themes. I don’t want to give away all the easter eggs, but if you get a chance to see it in person I hope you enjoy seeing what we included!
