Brickvention 2020 Spotlight: LEGO® Beckoning Cat

Dating back to the 18th Century Japan, the Beckoning, Maneki-Neko or Lucky Cat is a popular good luck charm and is said to bring good fortune and success! Our model builder Tullett wanted to build one for his Brickvention model as he has a growing collection at home and wanted to challenge himself using technic pieces to replicate the moving arm.

He started by using the LEGO® Porg and studying how the pieces could be used in the cat.

The cat holds a coin which translates to “1000 gold pieces” wishing wealth and prosperity to whomever he is around.

Can you believe there are only 12 exposed studs on his model? He achieved this by using a lot of slopes and tiles (particularly ones in newly released LEGO sets) to keep the cat round and smooth.

The most challenging part of the build was getting the arm to wave as accurately as possible whilst maintaining its balance. Tullett did this by using technic pieces built inside the model.

Watch Tullett talk about his build and to see the waving arm in action: