In 1946, Lego creator Ole Kirk Christiansen became the first toymaker in Denmark to buy an injection moulding machine, and began experimenting with cellulose acetate construction blocks.
His son Godtfred Kirk simplified his father’s brick design, perfecting its signature clutch power and switching plastics to the even more durable acrylonitrile butadiene styrene. For his colour palette, he looked to Dutch modernist Piet Mondrian’s Composition series: bright yellow, red, blue, and white. He patented the brick on January 28, 1958, and from that moment only looked forward.…
Given that modernism is based on making ideas new, repeatedly, these unprecedented times provide modernist NAMs with the opportunity to renew their markets and initiatives, over and over again, while others rely on more of the approach that worked in the old days, but is now patently inappropriate…
Likewise, making it new (over and over and over again) is an inextricable part of Lego’s DNA: just six two-by-four-studded pieces can be configured in 915 million ways….
Incidentally, if you are still in doubt about Mondrian and LEGOs’ mutual debt, ask yourself if you will ever again look at a Mondrian, without seeing the LEGO studs…
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