Lego buffs impress crowd at Lombard show

Indiana Jones, Harry Potter and sleek futuristic cities all came together Sunday at the Helen Plum Memorial Library in Lombard.

They were all part of the Northern Illinois Lego Train Club exhibition. A number of Lego enthusiasts built intricately detailed scenes out of Lego bricks. The scenes were then linked by moving trains.

Each scene rewarded close viewing. The Indiana Jones section, for example, included pristine reproductions of key moments from the films, such as the famous moment when Indy tries to snatch a golden idol inside a cave in “Raiders of the Lost Ark.”

A little further down stood a replica of the Quick Stop convenience shop and RST Video store from the Kevin Smith film “Clerks,” complete with Lego versions of the popular characters Jay and Silent Bob.

“We’re a group of adults who love Lego,” said West Chicago resident Kevin Koehler, a member of the Lego train club. “The train aspect of it helps animate the scenes and connect them, but it’s creating with Legos that we really love.”

Koehler built a vast city for the exhibition, which featured an elevated train, a modern-art museum and a movie theater complete with scenes from films projected via the screen of an iPod. Koehler said it took him three years to construct the entire thing.

The exhibit filled a downstairs room at the library with families who gazed and smiled at all the meticulously-crafted Lego vignettes in front of them.

“It’s the detail that’s most impressive,” said Lombard resident Mick Stapleton, who brought his two sons to the exhibit. “I could never do something like that. I’d be too worried one of my kids would break it.”