DUNCAN Titmarsh, the only certified LEGO builder in the UK, has constructed a four metre long scale model of a Thornycroft truck at Hampshire County Council’s Milestones Museum in Basingstoke as part of the successful LEGO Mania 2013 event.

This new build, which has involved around 150,000 LEGO bricks, complements the museum’s collection of vintage Thornycroft vehicles.  

Duncan, 42, from Surrey, has two teenage daughters and runs his own company called Bright Bricks. The former kitchen fitter discovered his Lego golden touch when friends asked him to build models for them. It grew into a part time job and from there he applied to LEGO to become an independent certified model maker.

Bright Bricks was established as business in 2007 and Duncan has never looked back.

He explained: “I had LEGO as a child and as an adult I picked it up again. It was in Woolies (Woolworths) one day and bought a set, got back into building LEGO again and it went from there.

“It’s good fun, hard, but good fun. You have to be organised with the amount of work we have coming in, that’s the hardest bit.”

The LEGO certification means Duncan must follow LEGO’s guidelines when building models. Those guidelines mean he won’t build anything related to alcohol, drugs, weapons, or anything political or religiously controversial.

At his workshop in Bordon, Hampshire, Duncan currently has around six million bricks ready for various different projects.

He explains: “I think about what scale we want, then guestimate the number of bricks we need and when we have them we build the project free hand.

“It is a skill, but you do learn more as you go along and it is trial and error. I don’t get everything right the first time around.” 

The more memorable items he has made out of LEGO include a Rolls Royce engine a metre and a half across and a scale model of a green house in Covent Garden which was made entirely from transparent bricks.

His ultimate ambition? “I would love to build a full size London double decker bus out of LEGO. It’s an iconic vehicle,” he concludes.

LEGO® Mania 2013 continues at Milestones until Sunday, April 14.