It was an absolute blast to design my interpretation of the Lost Boys’ hideout from the 1953 Disney animated movie Peter Pan. At 18” (45cm) tall—and over 1700 bricks—it’s a big creation which took me more than a month to design and refine. I opted to build and present this model like a “LEGO set,” complete with stable building techniques, play features, and a full assortment of minifigures. It just felt more appropriate to the subject material to channel some of my inner child, who loves nothing more than an exciting new LEGO kit. Like Peter Pan, I’m never growing up!
Watch the video above for an in-depth tour and exploration of the Lost Boys’ hideout, including demonstrations of its play features. Read on to see detailed images of the model, and learn more about the design choices that went into this playset.
Design Choices
Presentation-wise, I’ll admit that setting the model up for a “product photoshoot” on top of the rigorously-staged main image took extra work, but I really feel it was a worthwhile pursuit! In the image to the left, the Hideout really sings, and looks at a glance like an actual LEGO playset. Maybe I’ll fool a few folks on the Internet…
Figures I’ve decided to include are: Smee, Captain Hook, the Crocodile, Peter Pan, Wendy Darling, Michael Darling, Fox Lost Boy, Michael Darling, and Rabbit Lost Boy. I would’ve included more Lost Boys but for the limited number costumes LEGO has released in movie-accurate animals.
The concept of an above ground/below ground model occurred to me immediately as I set about building this creation, as the Lost Boys’ hideout in Peter Pan exists underneath Neverland’s “hangman’s tree,” inexorably mixed up with and formed by that ancient tree’s roots.
I knew I wanted to create a clear dichotomy between these the above and below-ground spaces, so leaned not just on elevation but on color to accomplish this goal. I’ve used green to delineate the ground, dark tan for the dirt, and brown as the wooden tree and roots which exist in both realms.
The framework inside the hideout leans on Technic and SNOT techniques to build up and reinforce an ironclad interior skeleton. By having such a rigorously strong core, I could include much more negative space in the build, thereby gaining extra room for play.
I tried my best to break up linearity in the model by transgressing between the hideout’s most discrete levels with roots, or else by making the platforms at different heights than one another. The mid-level especially has a definite slope from one side to the other.
The model’s coolest play feature was also the one hardest to figure out and implement: string-activated doorways. In the Peter Pan animated film, a character can pull on the noose of hangman’s tree, and simultaneously open numerous stump-shaped entrances all over its trunk.
I’m very proud and pleased to have captured this feature from the film. By tugging the noose, four round doors in the tree will lift open. I also left a place to hook the noose if one wishes these stump doors to remain open.
There are a number of different areas of interest in the underground portion of the hideout, including: a food pantry; an archery range; a spiral staircase; a kitchen; a tea set; and, largest of all, a communal sleeping area.
This, the hideout’s “living room,” has a fur-blanketed bed, a straw sleeping pad, a cool rug, and two hammocks made out of balloon sections. The hammocks constitute my favorite individual brick use of the whole model.
The other entrance into the Lost Boys’ hideout is through a hinging rock nestled between a few tree roots. This opens up to a ladder that drops a character off right by the pantry.
I embraced the opportunity to deck the “ground level” of the hideout out in brightly-colored foliage. Since the rest of the build leans so heavily on earth tones, I think a spot of lime or bright green helps to make the whole look a bit less drab.
Captain Hook and his first mate Smee prepare to lower a gift (spoiler: it’s a bomb) into the Lost Boys’ hideout. This can’t be good!
In the image here, these two villains are standing atop of a LEGO-built “hidden Mickey.” A hidden Mickey is an Easter egg present in many Disney animations, where the iconic three-circle silhouette of Mickey Mouse appears in an unexpected or covert place. In my model, it’s a clump of moss upon the ground.
Peter’s room contains a few sundry things, a stool, and maps of Neverland up on the wall. His space is divided from the living room by a cloth barrier, which is accurate to the movie.
Down and to the left from this room is a music room, which stores a few drums and also Peter’s famous panpipes.
I couldn’t accurately portray Peter Pan and the Lost Boys’ hideout without a few Native American items included. It’s worth noting, and noting strongly: Peter Pan’s depiction of indigenous North American people is racist. This is a stain on the film, in my eyes, and it’s one Disney themselves acknowledge today.
I want the items’ presence in LEGO form to remind us of this problematic history. I’ve left the items here, but they’re in a box, unused and not addressed by any of the Lost Boys, Peter, or the Darling children.
Presentation
Setting up for, taking, and editing the creation’s main image required a dizzying amount of thought and work… which, I gotta say, I think was worthwhile!
This was only my second time making use of color-changing LED panels in a LEGO photo; the first time was on my Halloween monsters.
In this setup, the LEDs help to differentiate between the above-ground space (which is partly lit in cold blue) and the below-ground space (which is lit with warm orange). The final setup, which I refined after 30-45 minutes trial and error, took 6 lights, 7 tripods, two poster boards, and a good quantity of painter’s tape.
I do my best to approximate the setup, lighting, and correct backdrop color of a presentation in physical ways first, because it makes the work on the computer much easier down the road.
In post-production, I’ve added more than a dozen layers of various functions to manifest a unique backdrop, glow up the light sources, and make this model really come to life. You can see a step-by-step re-layering of this finished image in the video at the top of this blog post.
Thanks for reading! If you have any other questions or thoughts about this model, feel free to leave them in the comments below.