BlueBrixx Castle Burg Eltz Set 103827

BlueBrixx's Castle Burg Eltz is a BlueBrixx-Pro model built from 6,085 blocks, measuring 51 × 32 × 23 cm assembled, in nine building sections. Designed by Martin, in dark tan with several shades of green. Parts come in numbered bags sorted by section, with a printed illustrated manual. No figures.

The real castle has belonged to one family for 850 years

Burg Eltz stands above the Elzbach in a wooded valley in the Eifel, and it has been owned by the Eltz family since the twelfth century — thirty-four generations, without interruption, to the present day.

That is close to unique among German castles, and the reason is not luck alone. Burg Eltz was never destroyed, in a region where almost everything was. It survived the Thirty Years' War and it survived the Palatine War of Succession in the 1680s, when French troops burned castles across the Rhineland systematically — because a member of the Eltz family was serving as an officer in the French army and arranged for it to be spared.

So what you are building is not a reconstruction. The castle looks as it does because nothing ever knocked it down: eight towers, steep slate roofs, half-timbering and oriels accumulated over five centuries by three branches of one family sharing the same rock.

One building step catches everyone out

Worth knowing before you start. The castle is built separately from its rock base, and at a certain point the finished structure has to be lowered onto that base and fixed with pins. It is the step reviewers consistently single out as the difficult one — you are manoeuvring a large, heavy assembly into position by feel.

Everything before and after it is straightforward. The set is intended for experienced builders, and around fifteen hours is a realistic total.

Specifications

Pieces: 6,085 · Nine building sections · Designer: Martin · Series: BlueBrixx-Pro · Printed manual, numbered bags · No figures
Model dimensions: 51 × 32 × 23 cm (20.1 × 12.6 × 9.1 in)