LEGO Trotting Lantern: Celebrating 2025 Lunar New Year

Each year, LEGO introduces several themed sets to celebrate the Lunar New Year, bringing the festive spirit into the hands of enthusiasts and collectors alike. 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 delighted fans with the Auspicious Dragon set, designed to resemble a bronze statue on a stand.

LEGO Spring Festival Trotting Lantern

0$129.95 at Amazon$129.99 at LEGO Store

Looking ahead to 2025, the Year of the Snake, LEGO has planned three unique sets to mark the occasion. The first, a Lucky Cat, embodies the charm of this beloved symbol. The second, named Good Fortune, is a vibrant pastiche of Chinese iconography featuring a decorative fan, a calligraphy pen and scroll, and golden ingots. The third and most luxurious set is the LEGO Spring Festival Trotting Lantern, which we had the pleasure of building and photographing for this review. This set is a detailed replica of a traditional trotting lantern, offering much more than meets the eye.

We Build The LEGO Trotting Lantern

98 Images

Before diving into the build, it's worth taking a moment to appreciate the lantern's intricate exterior. This model is lavishly detailed, with every inch adorned with decorative elements. From the hanging red lanterns on the buttresses to the gold detailing on the walls' borders, and the walls themselves depicting open skies and clouds framed by rocks, the set is a visual feast.

Building the lantern involves a delightful process of layering. You start by constructing the core lantern, followed by adding layers of details, and then even more intricate details on top of those. This step-by-step approach builds anticipation and excitement as you see the lantern come to life with each added piece. The now-retired LEGO Carousel was the last set to evoke this sense of wonder and anticipation in me.

Traditional trotting lanterns, originating from the Han Dynasty, were powered by oil lamps that projected silhouettes of paper cutouts and used heat to rotate propellers. LEGO's designers have cleverly replicated this effect with a modern twist. An upright rod activates a light brick, causing the lantern's base to glow with yellow light. This light shines through a clear piece with a black-lined image, projecting it onto the lantern's side. Turning the rod rotates the image around the lantern, mimicking the traditional mechanism.

The packaging suggests that the lantern can project images onto a wall or surface, but in practice, the projection is blurry and hard to discern. This feature feels overpromised, especially since original trotting lanterns were not designed for this purpose.

The upper tier of the lantern is a highlight, opening to reveal three hidden dioramas: a food stall serving dumplings, a decorations stall, and a shadow puppet theater. These dioramas are cleverly concealed within the lantern's cylinder, playing with the viewer's perception of depth and space. The set includes five minifigures, one sporting a snake costume, along with accessories like a plate of dumplings, a red envelope, a shadow puppet, and chopsticks.

Deciding whether to purchase this set depends on your priorities. If you're drawn to the mechanical effect of the rotating, lit-up image, it might not meet your expectations due to its limited clarity. However, if you're after a visually stunning set that hides intricate minifigure-scale scenery within an elaborately detailed structure, the LEGO Trotting Lantern is a magnificent way to celebrate the Lunar New Year. It's recommended for ages 9 and up, but its complexity suggests it's more suited for an 18+ audience.

For more LEGO inspiration, explore our selections of the best LEGO sets overall, the best Marvel LEGO sets, and the most expensive LEGO sets.

The LEGO Trotting Lantern, Set #80116, retails for $129.99 and contains 1295 pieces. It is available now at Amazon and the LEGO Store.