Review: 40263 Christmas Town Square
Posted by MeganL,You may be looking for some Christmas cheer to display either at home or the office, and seasonal sets are usually perfect for that use. Does the seasonal series end on a strong note with 40263 Christmas Town Square?
The front of the box shows the whole set, complete with three minifigs like the other Christmas vignette as well as several mini builds, including a rather imposing brick built Christmas tree. Like all the seasonals this year, there is a gift tag on the top right corner of the front with two lines indicating To: and From: lines.
On the back of the box there is another story featuring two of the minifigs in the set - the boy and girl. The girl is crushing on the boy in a major way, and is thinking about him while perfecting snowball making. The ensuing panels show her throwing snowballs at her crush while she's making a snow man, while he's mailing an letter, and then finally from behind the Christmas tree while he's walking by. The last panel shows that she's accomplished her goal: the two are working together finishing building the snowman. It's an interesting twist on the typical boy meets girl/boy likes girl/boy gets her attention by annoying her/boy and girl get together/happily ever after storyline.
My one complaint about the story on the back is that it doesn't show the other minifig in the set, nor does it feature all the elements of the set. Inside the box there are three unnumbered bags, an 8x8 white plate and an instruction booklet.
There are three minifigs in this set: a boy, girl and a woman. The woman has a nice purple twinset on with a pearl necklace and pendant. She wears snowy white pants which is befitting the season. She wears glasses and her hair is pulled up into a tight bun. I tend to think she's older simply because of the pairing of the glasses with such a severe hairstyle. Both the boy and girl are dressed in sweaters. The little girl has a Nordic style snowflake patterned sweater with a white shirt underneath, while the little boy has an white shirt with the top button unbuttoned under a brown argyle sweater. While it's winter, it can't be very cold if all three minifigs are only wearing sweaters and not coats! I think the boy's face looks a bit like Harry Potter (without the scar). All the minifigs heads and torsos are relatively new, only having been seen in a few sets before, particularly the Fun in the Park or Fun on the Beach sets.
Like 40262 Christmas Train Ride, this set is made of a series of smaller builds. The first is a sled that can be filled with mail and gifts to be hauled to/from the Christmas tree. Two 2x2 round slide shoes allow the sled to move smoothly, even when piled high with gifts. A relatively rare warm gold technic T-piece provides the handle for the sled that allows a minifig to hold on.
A small snowman that the boy and girl build is next. This is yet another variation of a snowman in a LEGO set, and it's about as awful as several other attempts. The use of a 1x3 white plate is interesting for the arms, but I don't like it. The lamp post is the same as the one found in 40262 but this one comes with a mailbox. The bright red of the mailbox is quite refreshing, especially considering the season.
There's a market stall included in this set too, clearly showing that 40262 and 40263 should be combined. This market stall is a small bakery with a couple colourful cupcakes. The little girl is clearly looking forward to enjoying them. Boy chasing is hard work!
The Christmas tree is the most substantial build of the set. I like the warm gold pieces used as a fence around the tree. The fence has two wreaths on once side for decoration. The tree itself is built with a multitude of dark green pieces and I think it's one of the better representations that we've seen of a Christmas tree in these size sets. The tree is decorated with multiple ornaments represented by 1x1 round tiles in red, orange, blue, yellowish green and gold. However, with the fencing, there's not a lot of room around the bottom of the tree for presents.
Overall thoughts
This is another delightful seasonal set. The Christmas tree is terrific and the whole set makes for a lovely little scene. For the price (169 pieces, $9.99, 9.99€, £8.49) it's a great set to pick up for an office display or a stocking stuffer. I think it will fit very well with the Winter Village sets (where this will be added in my house). One thing of note for both 40262 and 40263 - there are many spare parts that are included with each set.
40263 Christmas Town Square was clearly supposed to be paired with 40262 for display. They do in fact make for a very attractive scene displayed together.
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17 comments on this article
Wow, that image with the two sets placed together, makes it seem very good value for a nice and simple Christmas-themed scene.
It’s a great set and this years sets are terrific insertions into existing Winter displays. I love the concept of the product overall.
Very cute set and both sets combined look good and good deal too!
Gonna' incorporate into the Winter train and station layout.
I quite like this years vignettes. I think over all they will fit well into the christmas village/market theme
You meant to write 42063 Christmas Town Square was meant to be displayed with 42062?
the last image looks like an advent calendar set
@ Faunch
I think that was the intention of creating a small set which combines the small builds of the advent calendars
I will get it tommorow, love that big long christmas tree!
I think these two sets are way better than this year's City Advent Calendar. They are more Christmas-like in their expression and the builds are much more interesting. The only bad this is, that everything is built within a short time once the box has been opened - and not during 24 days ;o)
And I am still happy they can be bought directly without the need of purchasing a lot of other sets to get them as "gifts".
I'd say the wrinkles around the woman's eyes give her age away.
Go look at the advent calendars this year. Friends has ONE minifigure and junk, the city one is a lot more boring than this, and Star Wars is a normal BB8 with a hat. They are horrible.
Much better off buying 2-4 of these sets and having fun.
Love these, especially this second one.
Question: If we all go to our Lego Store for the December 5th Free Build, will these be sold out by then? Are they usually gone by then, based on past years?
Yes, these are excellent value and make a very nice addition to the winter village. I agree that they are overall way better than the advent calendars - I place each gift into a fabric calendar anyway so it would be easy to do with this although there would be some work required to create individual instructions.
^Yeah, great idea. I'm going to make these two sets my advent calendar. You can separate 20 days with the ornate fence for the 23rd and the tree for the 24th. Juice up the bench with some more food/cupcakes/mug/etc., give the kid figs. some snowballs and fill in the other 4 days with mini builds of toys like a plane, robot, car, etc. Should be fun!
In your reviews you have mentioned adding these to your Winter Village display. It would be neat to see pictures of how you arrange your display in a future article. I love setting up my own Winter Village display each year.
I bought these and built them together too. They are a nice small Christmas display all on their own. Fantastic value and adorable!
I find it odd (or interesting) that the woman figure has the double-faced head but the print is almost identical on both sides. I think the eyebrows are slightly different.