A while ago I had an epiphany.
I realised that I wasn’t an architect, and that I didn’t have to be an architect to MOC. For so long I’ve been building my LEGO blindly, plucking ideas from somewhere in my memory or imagination, and because of this, my MOC’s have been a bit, well, meh.
Why on earth I thought that I had to build without inspiration is beyond me, but I did; and it wasn’t until I saw a post on Flickr where the builder showed his build side by side with the ‘real’ thing, that I thought ‘hey that makes sense’.
Which leads me on to this build: Grand Theater.
I was looking for something that would compliment my MOC – Petticoat Lane so I Google Image Searched ‘Victorian Architecture’ – and this building caught my eye.
The Grand Theater in Du Quoin, Illinois.
I loved it’s small scale grandeur. The arches, the red brick; and it was something that I felt that I could replicate with the bricks that I had – which is always a bonus.
Also, because it was a real building, I could Google it.
And so I fell down the rabbit hole.
DU QUOIN — A century-old theater in the southern Illinois city of Du Quoin has closed.
The Southern Illinoisan in Carbondale reports Du Quoin’s economic development director, Jeff Ashauer, says the Grand Theater will be closed indefinitely.
The Grand Theater has been a fixture on the city’s Main Street since 1914.
The city loaned theater owner Richie Baker $20,000 last year for new digital projection equipment. City officials say none of the money has been repaid.
Ashauer says the city will seek input and ideas about the theater’s future. He says the structure is functional, but needs improvements.
The State-Journal Registrar, October 1, 2015
From a building point of view, choosing a real building to MOC meant that Google Earth became my friend. I was able to zoom in and check 3 sides of the building, which allowed me to include the little details (like the blue pallet and street signs) which add to the realism of a LEGO build.
It’s strange to have a connection to a building that I’ve never seen in real life, but I’ve grown fond of the Grand Theater.
The latest update that I could find about the Grand Theater is that Regions Bank, who owned the building, offered to donate it to the City of Du Quoin, however city officials declined the offer due to the high costs of getting the building back into a usable, safe state. In August 2018, the Grand Theater was sold for $5,000 to an unknown buyer.
lisaloveslego.com 