Today we’re reviewing the Bird of Paradise set. It’s our second foray into the Botanical sets if you don’t include the smaller Sunflowers, Roses or Tulips. The Flower bouquet has been a feature on our dining table for quite a while, so we’re excited to see how this set stacks up. On a semi-related note, I’m not quite sure why this set is called Bird of Paradise rather than Birds of Paradise, but if you find a botanist, find out for me would you please?
This set differs from the Flower Bouqet where you need to find your own vase. Instead it comes with a pot that the Birds live in and this is what we build first. The structure of the pot is built using a variety of SNOT bricks layered upon each other as you can see. It’s quite robust and the colour variation keeps it interesting.
Along the bottom of the pot, you can see a new (for us) brick – a 2/3 height 2 x 2 decorative beige plate.
After you continue for another layer beyond what’s shown above we start to build the supporting structure for the plants themselves. This sits on top of th base structure and provides a wide variety of holes for you to add more plants if you choose. We took the opportunity to do so as you’ll see later. By this point you can see the base is quite hefty with some weight to allow the Birds of Paradise to hold themselves up once “planted”.
After the frame we attach the surrounding cladding. I had to do a little fiddling as it’s not perfectly symmetrical and I wasn’t paying enough attention. With a couple of reviews of the instructions we got the cladding on and it looks great especially with the recessed opening along the base perimiter.
This helps to get ample drainage when we water them too!
Adding the leaves to the pot is the next step and there’s a few different sizes. Overall there are three diferrent size leaves, the largest at the top and right, the medium leaves and then the smaller leaves around the base.
Interestingly the instructions have the smaller leaves only at the rear of the pot, perhaps to avoid drawing too much attention away from the star of the show.
Although only half way there, compared to the real plant on the left, it already looks like it will fit straight in.
As we near the finish line, we build the actual Birds of Paradise themselves. There are three birds, because what sort of party can you have with just two? The designers have put in a quality effort to get the LEGO set close to the original. It’s not quite as vibrant, but in fairness, it’s difficult to replicate the real thing as it’s a stunning flower in real life.
Once the Flowers are added, it definitely gives the real life plant a run for it’s money. The last and final step is to add the soil – without it, the beautiful flowers will wither up and die without frequent watering.
I really looked forward to the next step. I thought it would be super satisfying to pour in the soil. Alas, my pouring skills are not quite what I imagined them to be, but it was still fun. Especially the second time around after I picked it the strays up from the floor.
Overall Thoughts
I loved building this set and it complements our entry way nicely. I really liked the ability to adapt it to support other LEGO botanical sets without too much effort. We added a couple of Sunflowers which adds some extra colour to an already really vibrant set.
If you’re looking for a great set that won’t need to be put away and can remain on display permanently I highly recommend the Birds of Paradise.
The original RRP of $169.99 is a little steep in my opinion with $149.99 being a more appropriate retail price. However, luckily at the time this blog was published, the set is on sale direct from the LEGO AU webshop for 30% off at $118.99. A great buy at this price!
Set: Bird of Paradise
Theme: Botanical
Set #: 10289
Number of Minifigs: 0
Number of Pieces: 1173
RRP: $169.99
Overall: 82%
