The Golden Gate Bridge used 64,500 Lego bricks to build and took 260 hours to build. [DNAinfo/Sam Cholke]
HYDE PARK — The Museum of Science and Industry has recreated some of the greatest achievements in architecture and engineering in Lego bricks for a new exhibit.
“Brick by Brick” opened Thursday at the museum, 5700 S. Lake Shore Drive, with a 60-foot-long Golden Gate Bridge, a One World Trade Center that nearly scrapes the ceiling and more, all built from Lego bricks.
Adam Reed Tucker of Arlington Heights has spent a year working out the difficult engineering problems of building these massive structures like the Golden Gate Bridge with pressure molded plastic as the only material.
“I had to build all of this like a real bridge. I didn’t build a sculpture of a bridge,” said Tucker, who worked as an architect on high-end homes in the northern suburbs until the real estate bubble burst.
Tucker said he started building architecture in 2006 and is now one of only 14 Lego- Certified Professionals worldwide, a sort of sanctioned designer and ambassador of the building toy, and designed 15 of the Lego architecture sets.
Adam Reed Tucker designed 15 Lego sets before building huge structures for the Museum of Science and Industry.
Among the structures Tucker has built for the Museum of Science and Industry is a working rollercoaster, the Gateway Arch in St. Louis and his personal favorite, the Hoover Dam.
“The Hoover Dam is supposed to look like a black-and-white photo,” Tucker said.
Despite his technical expertise, Tucker said all the design work, up to 215 hours for the Golden Gate Bridge, was done without a computer.
“I do all of this in my head — no computers,” Tucker said.
Adam Reed Tucker built the Burj Khalifa six times before he was satisfied with it.
He said he has a studio in his house where he tries out designs — he built the Burj Khalifa skyscraper six times before he was satisfied with it. The Golden Gate Bridge he said was the only one he didn’t see complete until it got to the museum — and things could have gone really wrong very easily.
The Gateway Arch collapsed when it was first set up at the museum because Tucker was off by 1.5 degrees when calculating the tilt of the base.
At 60 feet long and using 60 pounds of Legos to anchor either side of the 64,500-piece bridge, Tucker’s creation could also have collapsed.
“This wasn’t set up until we got here, so we were all holding our breath,” Tucker said.
The bridge did stand and will be on exhibit through February 2017.
The exhibit requires an additional ticket, which will be stamped with a time for entry, which costs $9 for adults and $7 for children ages 3-11.
The exhibit includes chances for visitors to build their own structures and contraptions.
Among the Lego buildings is the Museum of Science and Industry as it appeared during the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition.
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