Creator

Vestas Wind Turbine

A three-foot tower that actually spins, and honestly it won me over faster than I expected.

Brick Rated Score

4.0/5

Set 10268 · 2018

Pieces834

Minifigs3

Year2018

Set number10268

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The verdict

I did not think a single wind turbine could hold my attention, and then I switched on the motor and watched those blades turn while the little porch light glowed, and I got it completely.

This is a quiet, unusual set with real charm: a tidy service building, a genuinely lovely van, and a tower that reaches about three feet tall. The price is the sticking point (it launched at 199 dollars for 834 pieces), and if you want dense, clever engineering in your hands the whole time you may find long stretches of it repetitive. But as a calm, sculptural display piece with a motor that does something, it is special.

Best for: display builders who want a serene, motorized centerpiece rather than a parts-dense challenge

The full review

What it is

The Vestas Wind Turbine is one of those sets that sounds sleepy on paper and then quietly charms you in person. It is a 2018 Creator Expert release built around a working wind turbine: a service building at the base, a lovely little van parked outside, three technicians, a dog, and a tower that climbs to roughly three feet tall once you clip the sections together. What got me is the motion. This is not a static model with a spinning gimmick bolted on. You can turn the nacelle at the top left or right, and the included Power Functions motor drives the blades in a slow, steady rotation while a light glows by the front door. It feels less like a toy and more like a tiny, calm machine sitting on your shelf.

The catch

I will be straight with you about the money, because everyone else was too. At launch it cost 199 dollars for 834 pieces, and that price per part is high for LEGO. You are paying for the scale and the electronics rather than a dense pile of clever parts, and you should know that going in. The build itself has real quiet stretches. The blades and the long tower sections repeat, and the twelve bags inside the box are not numbered, so you spend time hunting for parts before you can get moving. A few builders also felt the finished tower was a little wobbly given its height, though it is anchored with Technic pins and the landscaping braces the base. None of this is a dealbreaker, but it is honest.

Who it's for

So who should bring this home? If you love display pieces with genuine presence, and you like the idea of flicking a switch and watching something actually move, this one rewards you every single time. It is also a gorgeous fit for anyone who cares about the real-world subject: renewable energy, engineering, quiet industrial design. Where I would steer you away is if you build for the joy of the build itself, the tricky techniques and the parts-dense puzzle. The turbine is more about the calm finished object than the journey there. Go in wanting a serene, motorized centerpiece and you will adore it. Go in wanting a two-hour engineering workout and you may drift.

The parts story

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

Building this one is a study in patience and payoff. You start with the little van, which is easily one of the best six-wide vans LEGO has made, and it is such a satisfying warm-up that I almost wished the whole set were that dense. Then you move into the service building, where the real cleverness hides: the Power Functions wiring is routed neatly under the furniture and behind green plates so the cables vanish, and the light pillars flank the door. After that comes the tower and the blades, which are long, repetitive sections that ask you to settle in and enjoy the rhythm rather than chase surprises.

The standout here is the printing. Every element that needs detail is printed rather than stickered, right down to the Vestas V on the two technicians' torsos, which is a real upgrade over the employee-only 4999 original from 2008 that used stickers. This was also one of the very first sets to include LEGO's plant-based elements, the sugarcane 'plants from plants' spruce tree, which is a genuinely meaningful bit of trivia to hold in your hand. Part-count value is the weak spot, so buy this for the motor, the scale, and the printing, not for a bargain bin of rare recolors.

Fun facts

01This is a re-release of set 4999 from 2008, which was originally made only for employees of the Danish energy company Vestas and almost impossible for the public to get.
02It was one of the first LEGO sets to include the sustainable 'plants from plants' elements, a spruce tree molded from plant-based plastic sourced from sugarcane.
03The finished turbine stands around three feet (roughly 100cm) tall, and unusually for LEGO it is close to a believable scale rather than shrunk down.
04It launched in November 2018 and retired in December 2020, and secondhand prices have since climbed well above the original 199 dollar retail.