Behind The Brick: The LEGO Monkie Kid Creative Team

Friday, May 15th, 2020 by Brickfinder

The launch of the new LEGO Monkie Kid theme was a huge event for the Asian market (especially China) and LEGO has shared with me some behind the scenes images that gives us a rare insight to the creative team.

LEGO Monkie Kid concept was birthed two years ago and LEGO assembled a diverse group of individuals to tackle the company’s first theme that embraces “Chinese culture and values”.

Simon Lucas (Senior Design Director) worked on one of companies longest running theme, LEGO Ninjago and served as the executive producer for the LEGO Ninjago Movie that graced the silver screen in 2017.

He has spent the last two years researching on Chinese culture and mythology to bring us what we now know as the LEGO Monkie Kid.

Senior Design Manager Dennis Fong is responsible for developing new LEGO play themes and supports product development through research and managing a team of model designers to deliver new play themes like LEGO Monkie Kid.

Senior Model designer Wen Xiaodong joined the LEGO Group in 2012 and is the first to hail from Beijing, China. He as worked on themes like LEGO Chima, Nexo Knights and the most recent Hidden Side.

Cool Fact: When he applied as LEGO Designer, his pitch was about a LEGO Monkey King.

Other designers who were part of the team includes Justin Ramsden (Hogwarts Castle, The Upside Down), Nick Vas (Ninjago City), Chris Perron (1989 Batmobile).