This Lego Ideas set recreates an iconic, vertigo-inducing photograph

Lego Ideas is awash with amazing ideas, a few of which actually end up as real sets. But this Lego Lunch Atop a Skyscraper set, based on an iconic and somewhat vertigo-inducing image, is one of the most surprising submissions we’ve seen.

If you’ve not seen the original Lunch Atop a Skyscraper picture, it’s an amazing and faintly disturbing picture. It’s staged, yes, but that doesn’t make it any less impressive. Taken during the construction of the RCA building in 1932, it shows eleven workers just chilling atop a giant iron beam, eating lunch, smoking, chatting and so on. And beneath them? It’s a long, long way down.

The image has been reprinted many, many times and now Lego builder DallasBricks has turned into a Lego Lunch Atop a Skyscraper set. “I also have a reproduction of this photo in my house and I thought it would be a really nice idea for LEGO to produce the Lunch atop a Skyscraper set,” DallasBricks explains.

What’s especially clever is that, as they put it, they’ve used “..construction techniques and pieces that can still make a fairly 3D view.” So, while they’re aping a 2D photograph, the model gives the impression of depth and scale. Lego Ideas’s staff were certainly impressed; they’ve chosen it as one of their staff picks, hopefully drumming up a little more support.

How much support does it need? Right now it’s sitting at 1,482 supporters, with nearly 600 days to hit the next milestone, 5,000 supporters. If it hits 10,000 supporters it’ll be reviewed by Lego and, potentially become a real set.

Want to lend your own support? Head over to Lego Ideas, sign up if you’ve not already done so, and get voting.