A Merry Potter Christmas MOC competition – and the winner is…

As nice and quiet the Christmas period was, as busy was the period just after. So only now can we reveal the winner of the MOC competition: A Merry Potter Christmas. And while Christmas may seem like a distant memory already, let’s have a look at who won…

I would like to send a big thank you all who submitted entries. It’s great to see how many took up the challenge to build their own creations for this. Also a big thank you to the two external judges, who assisted me selecting the winner:

• Cade Franklin, winner of LEGO Masters Australia – Season 1 (together with Henry Pinto).
• Richard Jones, editor of the Rambling Brick.

And lastly, I’d like to thank LEGO for providing the prize: Hogsmeade Village Visit (set 76388), which was one of my favourites from the 2021 range of LEGO Harry Potter sets.

As we shall see, the entries cover a wide range of Christmas scenes from the books/movies, but with the Yule Ball, not surprisingly, being particular popular.

But without further ado, let’s get to business…

Winner – Christmas in the Common Room

This model by James Kerr has a really nice Christmas feel to it. It shows a great use of various small models from the Advent calendars in a custom built Gryffindor common room and captures Christmas as you’d expect Harry and Ron celebrating it in their early years at Hogwarts.

One of the judges, Richard, in particular loved Harry and Ron in their ugly knitwear, the chess, and the broomstick wrapped under the tree. Overall, the model really shows it is Christmas, and integrates nicely many advent calendar models into the overall MOC.

Here are a few more photos of the Christmas in the Common room.

Runner up – Christmas at Godric’s Hollow

Just behind, we got this beautiful MOC of Harry and Hermione visiting Godric’s Hollow on Christmas Eve made by James Terry. Cade from the judging panel noted it is an original build of an unexpected scene and quite refreshing to see something a little different.

Also, building trees is hard – building snow-covered trees even more so. James has done a really good job here. Apart from Harry and Hermione, we also see Bathilda Bagshot (or what appears to be her), which is a nice touch.    

More Yule Ball magic

As noted, the Yule Ball was the most popular theme, so let’s have a look at some of the other great creations.

Max Eichler’s MOC titled Yule Ball and Snowy Castle also impressed the judges. Max has rebuilt the 2001 Hogwarts with a bigger Central tower and added grey roof, similar to the 2018-2020 Hogwarts sets. The rooms have been refurbished, and snow now cover the roofs and icicles hang from the ceiling over the Yule Ball in the Great Hall.

When it comes to capturing emotions, Christie Bridge’s Relationships at the Yule Ball really excelled. Richard said: This was nicely set up , and captured each character nicely, as well as the nature of their relationships at the time. High school was such an awkward time!

Apart from capturing the emotions really well, I was also impressed by the Weird Sisters playing in the background.

To round up the Yule Ball, we’ll also highlight Marcella Spear’s Yule Ball, a Magical Evening. This uses last year’s advent calendar builds in a very nice MOC of the Great Hall.

A Christmas Miracle

Moving beyond the Yule Ball, James Terry (who did the Godric’s Hollow MOC above) also submitted another entry – The Mirror of Erised. While no snow or Christmas decorations fill this model, it captures 25 December in Harry’s first year, where Harry had been exploring the Restricted Section of the Library in the invisibility cloak he got earlier that day. Trying to escape Filch, he enters the room with the Mirror of Erised. In the mirror he sees his mum and dad – which must have felt like a Christmas miracle for Harry there!

Christmas vignettes

We also have to highlight the clever MOC Hogwarts Christmas in Time by Cole De Haan. Richard really liked the little vignettes based on various Christmas references from throughout the series. Can you name them all?

That was all for now. Once again, thanks to all who played along – and congratulations to James for winning. I don’t have specific plans for another MOC competition yet, but I’d expect to end up doing two or three this year as well, so keep up your MOC building skills!

Now, I’ll get back to the last review of the 2021 sets – before the 2022 sets hit the shops in March.

Till then, Build the Magic!