On Tuesday, 19 December 2023, the LEGO Ideas team released the results of their last half of 2023 review with 71 designs under consideration. You can read the post and watch the video here. The second set listed was by Fan Designer Valentina Bima (aka Goannas89) and it’s titled “The Botanical Garden.”
Image from ideas.lego.com
It’s an awesome design with some great details and 8 minifigures. We’ll see what the final set looks like, but hopefully the LEGO designers can do it justice.
But wait…
Don’t we already have a Botanical Garden set?
We have #41757-1: Botanical Garden from the Friends theme as seen here.
I realize there are a lot of differences. Minifigures versus minidolls, one is designed as a play set while the other is a… bigger play set… maybe… and obviously size, but I’m curious as to why the Ideas team selected another Botanical Garden set when LEGO has one available already?
If LEGO is looking to appeal to a wider audience, I think they have done that already. I posted Tiago Catarino’s review video below. Around the 4:45 mark, he starts to talk about buying two of these sets and making a larger Botanical Garden. Tiago used two pieces from his collection to make it work and I have seen numerous other posts of people doing a similar thing. The Friends set has appealed to a larger audience already beyond the normal Friends fans. Why would LEGO need to try and do it again? #41575-1 costs $79.99 in the US. Two will set you back $159.98. Will this new Ideas set have more details at a lower price point? We’ll have to wait and see I guess.
Happy building!