How to Turn a Tiger into a T-Rex

Lego sets in my house don't stay as they should forever. They get rebuilt, refashioned into something else, sometimes into some imagined by Lego, sometimes into something imagined by me, sometimes into sometime imagined by another fan of Lego.

This is the story of the transformation of Lego Set 31129 - The Majestic Tiger into a T-Rex.

So I guess we should start with what the Majestic tiger looks like.

It is a very impressive set - one of the fancier creator 3:1 sets. It has 755 pieces, and is reasonable size. I actually didn't build this - it's one my partner built, but I will be taking it apart....

And restarting. I thought about building one of two other 'official models' - a red panda and a fish but neither of them appealed, so I set off to rebrickable which is a site full of alternative designs for something more interesting and I selected a T-rex, becuase, well dinosaurs are cool.

So then it's just a matter of starting to build. Much like any build it starts off looking like nothing much, I guess sort of like the foundations of a house

But before long it's starting to take shape, the body becomes evident, the tail sprouting in a similar build style to the original tiger set.

Add some legs and it's starting to get creepy, like a dinosaur which has been in the wars.

And of course the head, which is where the real magic of this design is - the eyes are particularly impressive, the yellow lizard like eyes are menacing. The jaw looks terrifying.

And then you put it all together and you get this - a T-rex