This set is my favourite of the line! A lot of my T.F.O.L. friends make fun of me for buying Elves sets, and then they ask how I got so many transparent pieces, and this set has a lot of them!

The main play feature of this set is so much fun the want the slop pushes the suspended crystals out of the way to reveal the earth key is just so interesting.

The inclusion of Miss Spry's turret really does seal the set as an amazing set.

Set #41076 Farran and the Crystal Hollow: Another set from LEGO Elves will be discussed in this review, and it’s an interesting set for the price point. Being the only male Elf from the first batch of sets it was nice to see the character offered in such a cheap set, as well as the unique new part introduced for the magical theme. However is this a set you should hunt down now that it’s become a little harder to find? I shall try to help you decide upon that with this review.

Box/Instructions

Box: I am a huge fan of all these box designs, but I find LEGO Elves to be my all-time favorites from a design standpoint. The visuals chosen and the great looking mythical design elements stand out as very well thought out for this theme. The front shows the set in all its glory while the back includes all of the features and show the Elves with their new friend Emily Jones as they start the search for the four elemental keys to unlock the portal back home.

Instructions: A set this small should never break up the instructions between two numbered manuals, however it seems that the designers for LEGO Friends, Elves and Disney Princess have a fondness for doing just that whenever a numbered bag build is involved. But this set doesn’t have numbered bags, so why go to the trouble of separating each model between different manuals?

The smaller of the two is barely 15 pages long while the larger one features all of the steps for the larger model and includes the same wonderful artistic shot at the end that shows the story in visual form. You’ll find the set checklist in the back of the smaller/shorter of the two manuals. All of the steps are easy to follow in each book and you won’t have any trouble.

Parts

This set is great for new parts, you’ll find a load of purple plant pieces, clear bricks in green and blue which aren’t found too often in LEGO sets and the large green key piece that is what the Elves are searching for to help Emily. There’s also a six stem flower piece, so this makes a great parts pack.

Minifdoll

Farran Leafshade: As the main male character in the theme Farran has a very nice unique look, his lower legs are the standard legs found on Friends mini-dolls, the kind of pants that the female characters wear, so there are no pockets on the back. They are a rich dark green. His top is very highly detailed with a nice gold pattern on his undershirt and some gold markings on the green vest he’s wearing.

His belt features a leaf as well, as the Elf of Earth this tone makes sense for him. With a marking on his arm to indicate his talent and the markings on his cheeks Farran looks great. His unique hair is a nice touch as well a dark brown in colour with sculpted ears on the side of his head. He carries a sack in one hand and unleashes magic in the other.

Miss Spry: This squirrel piece has an attitude according to the show and is in a very interesting yellow colour with printed markings on her face. As an animal character she’s pretty neat and only available in this set.

The build

The smaller of the two models is a simple little build and there isn’t much too it, the larger of the two, which is the Crystal Hollow just looks brilliant. It’s full of fun techniques to build up the large magical tree where the key is hidden. It’s so much fun to build and quite easy to follow, I particularly enjoy the method used to make the crystal bits with 1x2 bricks then 1x1 bricks and then cheese slices used to build it up.

The completed model

The Crystal Hollow model is very impressive looking, it’s a slightly large tree with many crystals surrounding it include a clear blue burp piece from the back. There are a couple of play features, a jumper plate at the top of the tree can be used to hold Miss Spry while a small seat to one side has a bottle and a map accessory showing off the mystical key and the path to take to find it.

Pull on a section in the front and two parts of crystal flip open to reveal the magical key that Farran is searching for. This is a great looking model and I can’t say that enough.

For a smaller model there’s a bit of rocks with a catapult on it, here Miss Spry can sit next to the catapult and launch acorns at Farran. The acorns are those little icing topped pieces in a slight pearl gold colour, because acorns in Elvendale aren’t like acorns in our world. It’s a decent little side model to add more play features to the set.

Overall opinion

This is a great first year set from LEGO Elves with tons of great parts for MOC builders to enjoy. I definitely recommend this set because you are going to really enjoy it, the look and design of the main model just really stands out as something never seen in LEGO before and the strange purple plants is just a really impressive design choice for the realm of LEGO Elves.