Singapore monuments in Lego on display at National Library

Left: Brick artists Eugene Tan and Xylvie Wong, with the National Heritage Board's Mr Alvin Tan and Mr Ian Lee, at the Lego model of Sultan Mosque during the opening of the Building History: Monuments In Bricks And Blocks travelling exhibition at the
Brick artists Eugene Tan and Xylvie Wong, with the National Heritage Board's Mr Alvin Tan and Mr Ian Lee, at the Lego model of Sultan Mosque during the opening of the Building History: Monuments In Bricks And Blocks travelling exhibition at the National Library Building. ST PHOTOS: GAVIN FOO
Left: Brick artists Eugene Tan and Xylvie Wong, with the National Heritage Board's Mr Alvin Tan and Mr Ian Lee, at the Lego model of Sultan Mosque during the opening of the Building History: Monuments In Bricks And Blocks travelling exhibition at the
The model of Thian Hock Keng Temple caught the attention of three-year-old Summer Tan, who was with her mother. ST PHOTOS: GAVIN FOO

Eight miniature national monuments built using more than 110,000 Lego bricks are on display at the basement of the National Library Building.

The historical landmarks are the Central Fire Station, former Tanjong Pagar Railway Station, Jurong Town Hall, the former Nanyang University Library, the National Museum of Singapore, Sultan Mosque, Thian Hock Keng Temple and St Andrew's Cathedral, which is the tallest at 1.1m.

The Building History: Monuments In Bricks And Blocks exhibition was initiated by the National Heritage Board (NHB), which worked with three artists from My Little Brick Shop - Ms Xylvie Wong, 34, Mr Eugene Tan, 41, and Mr Andy Goh, 35 - who have architecture and design expertise, to plan and build the replicas.

The exhibition aims to educate people about the places' significance, history, stories and architectural diversity.

Mr Alvin Tan, the NHB's assistant chief executive in charge of policy and community, said: "Each of these monuments played an important role in Singapore's history.

"What we hope when visitors look at the replicas, they like them so much that they decide to visit the actual monuments."

The project started last October and took more than seven months to complete. Before building the models, drones were flown over the various buildings to provide an aerial view of the monuments.

The public can catch the free exhibition from June 7 to 30, from 10am to 9pm daily, except on public holidays.

Visitors stand to win attractive prizes by guessing the number of Lego blocks used to construct the Sultan Mosque - the largest model displayed, weighing more than 40kg - by uploading a photo of the model on social media with the hashtags #BuildingHistorySG and #librarysg with their answers.

The travelling exhibition will make its way to Marine Parade Public Library in July, followed by Jurong Regional Library, Tampines Regional Library, Ang Mo Kio Public Library and Sengkang Public Library. The final exhibition will be from Dec 1 to 30 at Choa Chu Kang Public Library.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on June 08, 2018, with the headline Singapore monuments in Lego on display at National Library. Subscribe