Many Canadian AFOLs are familiar with Canada First Bricks (CFB). They are our nation’s largest BrickLink retailer and have their warehouse in Montreal. I’ve ordered from them in the past and gone to pick up in person. On one such occasion, they gave me a tour of the facility. It was impressive. For 2024, they teamed up with Brault & Bouthilier, Canada’s official distributor of LEGO® Education products, to start Montreal’s first downtown LEGO®-inspired convention. They invited me to attend, and their inaugural show also became my first experience as an exhibitor at a LEGO®-related event. With the exhibition now behind me, I thought I’d share my experiences with a Sommet de la Brique recap.

Sommet de la Brique took place at Palais des Conrès on September 14 and 15, 2024. That is the same venue that hosts many of the city’s prestigious shows and conventions, like Montreal Comic Con. There have been other LEGO® exhibitions in Quebec in the past, but none in the downtown core. It is about time that we got one! This year’s event brought 158 LEGO® builders and vendors together in 82 different booths spread out in more than 25,000 square feet. Approximately 1500 visitors attended the show, which is not a bad turnout for an inaugural event. CFB has already committed to Le Sommet de la Brique 2025 at the Palais. However, they plan to upgrade the space to one of the venue’s larger halls. It is a wonderful location if you plan to visit the city as it sits on the doorstep of Old Montreal.

My booth at le Sommet de la Brique

Interestingly enough, I did not take any photos of my own, complete booth. I took pictures of the displays I brought individually in some of my early trial configurations. But I got caught up in the exhibition, speaking with attendees, and looking at all the builds. I forgot to photography the setup in its entirety. I decided to showcase many of the builds I have previously shared here on the blog. While I like writing and photography, I recognize its limitations. I thought it would be fun for readers to see some of the builds from the articles in person.

I had three tables. Since I present a lot of photos and occasional drawings on social media, I set up a couple of displays consisting of picture frames. I was quite proud of my recent Dungeons and Dragons Minifigure photos, so I printed them to share. I also jumped back a few years and printed my Brickstock Fantasy Minifigures Series (my latest series isn’t ready yet). Since True North Bricks started by offering free Minifigure colouring pages, I dug out and printed a few of those pages (along with a new addition) for show attendees to take home. Since I had to stop offering them online, I thought that would be a fun throwback at the event.

Ahoy, matey!

As for builds, one of my displays was my Imperial Outpost MOC. I shared photos of this here on the blog back in January ’23. For the show, I updated the display by expanding the ocean and bringing along my 1992 Imperial Flagship (set 6271). People commented most on the Islanders raiding the tower. I was thrilled about that since it is my favourite detail.

Next, I displayed the wedding commission MOC I built for June ’23. This might have been the last hurrah for this display. I will need all the bricks used for the waterfalls in another MOC coming up. I’ve also thought of ways to make the large waterfall look better. In short, I am planning to take this display apart soon. I didn’t really change anything about the piece for the exhibition.

Cup of Joe?

The first MOC I built after exiting my dark ages was a LEGO® Tim Hortons. That was back in 2016. The build has gone through some changes in the years since. I posted about some of them in 2020. When I started dismantling my LEGO® city to make room for custom projects, I didn’t have the heart to take apart my Tim’s. As my first MOC, it is a special one. So, I upgraded it to a MILS plate for the show and added a little street segment in front. Perhaps it will live on as a show display piece. People really seemed to enjoy it at le Sommet de la Brique, especially when I took the roof off to share the interior. You can see in the images above, my UFO was also on display.

Another popular piece at the booth was the Jurassic Park logo I made for the 30th anniversary of the film. Visitors also liked the idea of modifying the colours of the Majestic Tiger set, and peeking into my caveman shadowbox. Just to tell people who I am, I used the new Message Board set. I also brought along my LEGO® logo built in the art set style, and my award winning frog (which oddly doesn’t appear in any of my photos). The final display piece was my Orc Siege Tower.

Builds from the wonderful AFOL community!

There were so many talented builders at le Sommet de la Brique, I simply can’t do them all justice in this blog post. But I will share a few of them that really inspired me. Firstly, I had a wonderful view of the Twin Towers from across the aisle the whole weekend. Including the aerials, these buildings are taller than me, towering at 7′ 9″ (I am 6′ 1″). They were built by Nathalie Boucher, who was an absolute delight to chat with. The build includes over 45,000 bricks and weighs 100 pounds.

Also near my booth were the stunning artistic stylings of Étienne Goyer (@blackmachine312 on Instagram). He used the LEGO® Art style of building to create an epic portrait based on the manga/anime One Piece. Étienne’s colour selection made this piece seem like it glowed when I viewed it from a couple of booths away. It was almost like looking at a TV screen.

There were many wonderful fantasy worlds to behold…

A little farther away, I re-encountered the Medieval world of Caitlin Harvey (@katebrickque on Instagram). I first saw her display when I visited Brickomanie 2023. In the year since, Caitlin has expanded the scene by adding buildings to her village and starting the construction of a major castle. I remain thoroughly impressed by her use of 1×1 cheese wedges in trans dark blue to create ocean waves. Caitlin and I had a number of fun chats over the weekend, and she really helped introduce me to LEGO® convention culture as a first-time exhibitor.

Another experienced LEGO® convention exhibitor I finally got to meet was Anabelle (@brickswhynot on Instagram). I’ve been aware of her exploits on social media for some time, so it was great to finally meet in person. Anabelle’s creation was a fantasy mushroom world complete with motion. The whole display rotated independently from the central mushroom building. There were so many little Minifigure stories incorporated into the build, I could have spent ages studying them all. The build is a wonderful example of getting inspired by LEGO® characters are running with it.

Off to the future!

Out of the fantasy realms into more sci-fi, I was super impressed with the dystopian Montreal future called Neosheaga. It was a team build featuring creations by Matthew Sklar (@mj_sklar on Instagram), Francis St-Germain (@thy_brickheadz on Instagram), Les Foutch (Les Foutch on Facebook), Jean-Philippe Leroux (@leroux_jp on Instagram), and Francis B (@bib_brick on Instagram). The build shows a future Montreal which is partially submerged. I am told the orange sphere top poking out of the water is meant to be the remains of the Orange Julep. The build techniques were phenomenal in this display. Keep in mind that the buildings had interiors too!

Blast off to space!

Continuing on with sci-fi, I met Yanick Bouchard-Latour (@yanick.bouchardlatour on Instagram). We had a couple of chats over the weekend where we talked about everything from compatibility of different LEGO® brand blocks to his awesome mod of the Friends Mars Space Base and Rocket (42605). He bought several of the sets on sale at Costco and built a really cool looking space station. I think the Friends colours really work well in this display.

Then there was the epic space ship by Anthony Sergerie-Pelletier. As I write this, he does not have a social media presence, but he said he’s planning to get something going soon. I was BLOWN AWAY by this build. The exterior details were phenomenal, but the ship had fully detailed interiors too. Anthony won the exhibitor’s choice award at the show, and he certainly deserved it.

An airshow for the ages.

I also met Tiago Chasqueira who builds replicas of military airplanes out of LEGO® bricks. He’s got a nice selection going already, but plans on some future upgrades, including printed tiles instead of vinyl stickers. We also chatted about his plans to expand the display around the airplanes… but I don’t want to give all the details here. Let’s leave it surprise for all of you to see at future shows! His enthusiasm for his builds and hobby really shines when you speak to him, and those kinds of interactions make for a fun experience at these shows. Tiago occasionally posts about his builds on the Lego Air Command Group Facebook page.

I could go on and on about le Sommet de la Brique, but hopefully now you’ve had a little taste of what there was to see if you were unable to make it. Since I was alone manning my own booth, I unfortunately did not have the chance to stop and chat with all the other exhibitors. But I had a great time with those I did manage to meet and with everyone who stopped by the True North Bricks booth. I hope to be able to attend next year. While the date is not set in stone yet, be sure to keep it in mind and stop by if you can. Did you attend le Sommet de la Brique? What was your favourite build? Let me know in the comments or reach out on social media.

Until next time,

-Tom

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