Design by Me: 1:1 Customization

Design your own custom LEGO® set, box, and buiding instructions

Role

Design lead

Role

Design lead

Role

Design lead

Industry

LEGO® Systems A/S

Industry

LEGO® Systems A/S

Industry

LEGO® Systems A/S

Years

2007-2010

Years

2007-2010

Years

2007-2010

The Ultimate Product Customization

Design byMe (originally LEGO Factory) began in 2005 as a pilot experiment in crowdfunding LEGO designs. The very first iteration would allow users to compete to digitally design a LEGO set which LEGO.com users would vote into production.

Amazingly, this was 4 years before Kickstarter set the stage for crowdfunding. Also it was 5 years before the introduction of Minecraft and the iPad.
I moved to Denmark specifically to become the design lead on this project.
We operated as a small 5-7 person start-up within LEGO. Optimizing the experience, promoting, and working logistics.

The Ultimate Product Customization

Amazingly, this was 4 years before Kickstarter set the stage for crowdfunding. Also it was 5 years before the introduction of Minecraft and the iPad.
I moved to Denmark specifically to become the design lead on this project.
We operated as a small 5-7 person start-up within LEGO. Optimizing the experience, promoting, and working logistics.

The 1:1 Pilot

After existing for a year, Design byME pivoted to full customization.
Users could design their own LEGO Set with a selection of hundreds of bricks. They they could design a custom premium box and receive printed custom building instructions.
Users had a custom box designer which where they could let their imagination go wild!

How it worked

This is a promo video from the 2009 version of Design byME, which gives an idea of the overall system.

User interface of the Design byME website

Reflections

After several years of shipping hundreds to thousands of custom sets a day, Design byME shut its doors in 2010. For a time, we experimented with other modular building systems with less complexity.

Why did it close? Simply put, customization at this level of granularity is very hard to keep profitable, especially when compared with other evergreen product lines in LEGO.
However, at the same time, the spiritual successors to Design byME launched. This included LEGO Ideas (which I also had the pleasure of working on), and LEGO Architecture. Both projects are still going strong!
The 3D building tool, heavily evolved, is still in use at LEGO for model designers. A version of it was also used to create assets for the LEGO Movie.

Reflections

After several years of shipping hundreds to thousands of custom sets a day, Design byME shut its doors in 2010. For a time, we experimented with other modular building systems with less complexity.

Why did it close? Simply put, customization at this level of granularity is very hard to keep profitable, especially when compared with other evergreen product lines in LEGO.
However, at the same time, the spiritual successors to Design byME launched. This included LEGO Ideas (which I also had the pleasure of working on), and LEGO Architecture. Both projects are still going strong!
The 3D building tool, heavily evolved, is still in use at LEGO for model designers. A version of it was also used to create assets for the LEGO Movie.