Each year, LEGO celebrates the Lunar New Year with themed sets that capture the spirit of the occasion. In 2021, during the Year of the Ox, LEGO released a Spring Festival set set in a traditional garden. Fast forward to 2024, the Year of the Dragon, and LEGO introduced the Auspicious Dragon set, designed to resemble a bronze statue on a stand.
LEGO Spring Festival Trotting Lantern
As we approach 2025, the Year of the Snake, LEGO is set to launch three new sets to mark the celebration. The first set features a Lucky Cat. The second, named Good Fortune, is a pastiche of Chinese iconography showcasing a decorative fan, a calligraphy pen and scroll, and golden ingots. The third and most opulent set, which we've had the pleasure of building and photographing for this review, is the LEGO Spring Festival Trotting Lantern.
Priced at $129.95 at Amazon and $129.99 at the LEGO Store, this set is a detailed replica of a traditional trotting lantern. Much like other LEGO builds with a focused theme, this lantern offers more than meets the eye.
We Build The LEGO Trotting Lantern
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Let's take a moment to appreciate the exterior of this model, which is detailed to an almost extravagant degree. Every inch of the set is adorned with decorative elements—from the red lanterns hanging from the buttresses to the gold detailing on the borders of the walls, and even the walls themselves, which depict an open sky and clouds framed by rocks.
Building the lantern involves a process of layering. You start with the basic core of the lantern, then add layers of intricate details on top, followed by even more detailed elements. This process builds an anticipatory joy, reminiscent of the delight I felt with the now-retired LEGO Carousel, where each step unveiled new, elaborate decorative elements.
Traditional trotting lanterns, dating back to the Han Dynasty, were powered by oil lamps that projected silhouettes of paper cutouts and used the heat to rotate propellers, thereby moving the silhouettes. LEGO's designers have recreated this effect with a mechanism that, while limited, still captures the essence. An upright rod activates a light brick, illuminating the bottom of the lantern with a yellow glow. This light shines through a clear piece with a black-lined image, projecting it onto the lantern's side. Turning the rod causes the image to rotate around the lantern.
The packaging suggests that you can project this image onto a wall or other surface. However, in my experience, the projection was blurry and difficult to discern. It's puzzling why LEGO would highlight this as a feature, especially since the original trotting lanterns were not designed for this purpose.
The upper tier of the lantern opens to reveal three hidden dioramas: a food stall serving dumplings, a decorations stall, and a shadow puppet theater. These dioramas, cleverly concealed within the lantern's cylinder, play on the viewer's perception of depth and space. The set includes five minifigures, one adorned with a snake costume on its head, along with accessories like a plate of dumplings, a red envelope, a shadow puppet, and chopsticks.
Your decision to purchase this set may hinge on what you're looking for. If it's the lit-up, rotating mechanical effect, it might not meet your expectations in terms of clarity and impressiveness. However, if you're after a visually stunning piece that hides intricate minifigure-scale scenery within an even more detailed container, this set is a splendid tribute to the Lunar New Year. It's recommended for ages 9 and up, though the complexity of the final build suggests it's more suited for older builders.
For more LEGO inspiration, explore our picks for the best overall LEGO sets, the best Marvel LEGO sets, and the most expensive LEGO sets.
The LEGO Trotting Lantern, Set #80116, retails for $129.99 and consists of 1295 pieces. It is available now at Amazon and the LEGO Store.
