The LEGO Group
Design Intern · Aug 2023 to Jan 2024
/images/roles/lego/hero.webp
Patrick standing in the LEGO Campus atrium in Billund, with the building's animated display screens behind him
- Organisation
- The LEGO Group
- Title
- Design Intern
- Location
- Billund
- Period
- Aug 2023 to Jan 2024
- Tools
- Siemens NX · Rhino · Makerspace and metal workshop
Six months in LEGO's Creative Play Lab developing and testing original play concepts. My concept was selected for further development, ranked first out of 41 pitches, and first among the concepts from seven other design interns.
The role
Developing original play concepts and taking them from idea to tested prototype.
Prototyping
Built and iterated 15+ physical prototypes, working to structural stability, building challenge and adherence to the LEGO System in Play.
Testing with users
Took part in and ran toy testing sessions, observing behaviour and translating what I saw directly into the next prototype rather than into a report.
What I took from it
Going into the internship I noticed how many job adverts asked for practical experience and specific software skills, and the one that came up again and again was CAD. So I set myself the goal of building those skills while I was there. I focused particularly on Siemens NX, setting myself exercises, finding ways to solve my actual work tasks in NX, and asking the more experienced designers for help whenever I was learning something new. We also had three teaching modules in Rhino, and I used the free workshop days to work on personal projects purely to get better on the machines. I can't show the prototypes I developed, but looking back the progression in how I use NX is obvious to me. The other thing I wanted was to learn from the best. Creative Play Lab is full of very skilled designers, and there were almost as many approaches as there were people, some wanted to be down in the makerspace working with materials, some drew their ideas thoroughly before going into the third dimension, some preferred that we arrived at a solution together by discussing it. What they share is an understanding that creativity is not something that appears under stress and pressure. It happens in the back of your mind when there is free space to think and you are enjoying yourself. My manager kept repeating: "You can't invent something fun if you're not having fun yourself." I learned to actually set aside time for the creative process and let ideas arrive more passively. One thing I questioned was the amount of user testing. I often saw a lot of time going into high-fidelity prototypes rather than testing as early as possible, which runs against the approach in Rocket Surgery Made Easy, test the prototype as fast as you can without making it perfect. It varied by brief; when the design lead was less certain about the audience, more testing happened. My third goal was to get better at voicing my opinion in decisions. That was hard at the start, as an intern it is difficult to know where your place is when feedback is being given on prototypes in a room full of more experienced designers. I got more confident as it went on, especially during user tests, where I often noticed things others didn't. That made me more confident in my ability to give constructive input, and it is something I'll pay attention to next time I start somewhere new.
/images/roles/lego/campus-figure.webp
A giant LEGO minifigure statue in the garden beds outside a LEGO Campus building at dusk
/images/roles/lego/car-display.webp
A LEGO Technic Bugatti Chiron model on display in a LEGO Campus lobby
Internal portfolio
Requires a LEGO Group employee account to open, the prototype work itself is confidential and shown only inside these links.