Friends

Restaurant and Cooking School

The little bowl of light-yellow spaghetti is the piece I keep picking up and putting down.

Brick Rated Score

4.2/5

Set 42655 · 2025

Pieces896

Minifigs4

Year2025

Set number42655

Check price on Amazon

Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

The verdict

This is the Friends set that quietly borrows from the grown-up modular buildings, and it works.

You get a two-story heritage-style restaurant with a chef's-hat icon and a plate of spaghetti built right into the facade, an outdoor dining area, a delivery scooter, and four mini-dolls plus Churro the cat in his tiny chef's hat. It is a touch pricey for 896 pieces and the interior layout has one genuinely odd choice, but as a play-and-display piece it charmed me more than I expected. If you like restaurant builds and food details, this one earns its shelf space.

Best for: Friends fans and food-detail lovers who want a build with modular-building charm at a kid-friendly scale

The full review

What it is

I did not expect a Friends set to remind me of the modular buildings, but here we are. The Restaurant and Cooking School is a two-story heritage-styled building topped with a chef's-hat icon and a plate of spaghetti, and the first time I stood it up I caught myself grinning at how much it borrows from the Parisian Restaurant playbook. There is a cookery-school kitchen upstairs, an outdoor dining area, a little delivery scooter with the restaurant logo on the side, and four mini-dolls (Leo, Aliya, Sara, and the new Chef Marta) plus Churro the cat, who greets customers in his own tiny chef's hat. It is warm and full of story, and the food detailing is the thing that got me.

The catch

I will be honest about the money, though. At roughly 79 dollars for 896 pieces, the price per piece is on the higher side, and more than one reviewer flagged it as expensive for what you get. Some of that cost went into the extra height, which I actually think was worth it, because Friends sets so often drown in gorgeous accessories with nowhere to put them, and this one finally gives them a home. The interior planning has one head-scratcher: the toilet sits directly in front of a window that looks out over the street-side seats. There is also a running joke among builders about meals being stored up on the roof. None of it ruins the set, but if you want flawless realism, these little quirks will nag at you.

Who it's for

So who lands where on this one. If you love restaurant builds, food details, or the cozy storytelling side of Friends, I think you will really enjoy it, and the fact that it converts fairly easily into a modular-style building makes it a smart pick for display fans who do not want to spend modular money. Kids who love pretend play get an enormous amount here between the kitchen, the diners with their delight-and-disgust faces, and the scooter. The people I would steer away are pure technical builders chasing clever engineering, and anyone who needs every price-per-piece calculation to come out ahead, because this set leans on charm and accessories rather than parts-count value.

What works

The facade genuinely echoes the modular Parisian Restaurant, with a tile-built chef's hat and spaghetti icon that read beautifully from across a room
Loaded with restaurant accessories that finally have somewhere to live: oven, blender, mixer, cheese grater, piping bag, menu cards and more
Chef Marta is the first Friends character with a tattoo, and the reaction faces on the diners are a sweet touch

Worth knowing

At around 79 dollars for 896 pieces it feels a little steep, and reviewers said as much
The toilet sits right in front of a window looking out over the street-side seats, which is a strange piece of interior planning
The food-on-the-roof play detail raised a few eyebrows for practicality

Sold? Grab it.

Check price on Amazon

Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

Building this feels like decorating a small restaurant rather than grinding through a big architectural set. The 896 pieces come together into a two-story shell with real personality, and a lot of the joy is in the fiddly little stations: the oven, the blender, the mixer, the cheese grater, the piping bag, the salt and pepper shakers, the menu cards and the notepad. It is not a long or demanding build, which suits the age-8-and-up target, but there are enough distinct areas (kitchen, dining room, outdoor seating, scooter) that it never feels repetitive the way a single-room build can.

The standout part is the food. LEGO used the yarn-ball mould in a cool light yellow to make a genuinely convincing bowl of spaghetti, dropped into a bowl for that soft noodle texture, and there is a new dumpling mould in tan too. The tile-built chef's hat centered on the upper floor is a lovely bit of parts-usage, and Chef Marta earns a footnote in Friends history as the theme's first character printed with a tattoo. The diner mini-dolls come with alternate faces so you can swap between delight and disgust as they taste-test the dishes, which is a small printed-part detail that adds a surprising amount of play value.

Fun facts

01Chef Marta is the first LEGO Friends character to feature a printed tattoo.
02The bowl of spaghetti uses the yarn-ball mould in a cool light-yellow color, paired with a new dumpling mould in tan.
03Builders quickly noted the set converts into a modular-style building fairly easily, giving it more display appeal than a typical Friends set.
04Churro the cat wears his own tiny chef's hat and 'greets customers' at opening time in the set's play scenario.