Silkwood Street
All LEGO fans have always tried to improve their creations by adding different businesses & establishments in their cities/towns. We have the common cafes, restaurants, police/gas/fire stations, hospitals, houses, flower shops, car repair shops and more. So thinking a bit outside the box, one would wonder how all our LEGO buildings have their furniture and minifigs have their beautiful clothes. Silkwood Street answers a bit of that question.
Silkwood Street is a 32×32 modular MOC set that has 3 unique buildings; a seamstress’ shop, a carpenter’s workshop and a furniture shop. While other builds focus on grand scales with 4-5 levels high and a single establishment in a 32×32 baseplate, Silkwood Street focuses on the smaller buildings but has lots of small details both in the exterior and interior. As a favorite YouTuber of mine would always say, DIVERSITY & DENSITY. The MOC set creates a scene similar to what you would see in a town with interesting buildings & stories behind each one.
The seamstress’ show was the first building to be designed. The sand green, tan and white combination leaves a warm & inviting ambiance making any visitor want to look inside and see what the seamstress has to offer. The ground floor serves as the workshop with a sewing machine, mannequins, cloths and small tools. The bright pink & white tile works might seem odd but fits the theme and works well given that it is a shop for clothes. The 1st floor is the living space complete with a bed, small kitchen/dining area & toilet. It also has an access ladder going to the attic (A.K.A. future LEGO room).
The carpenter’s workshop is an old style building which mainly takes inspiration from Hagrid’s hut (official LEGO set 75947). the light & dark gray, tan and brown colors create the stone built style and distinguishes itself apart from normal straightforward square buildings. It is small but has the basic necessities for the carpenter to make his wonderful furniture. It has a working table, wall cabinet, wood cutter & hole boring machine. The 1st floor is the living space with a bed, small kitchen, comfy chair and even a fire place with a working light.
The store keeper’s furniture shop is more modern and sleek. It has a clean dark blue & white look which exudes a bit of class and poise. The interior is equally interesting as the exterior with different furniture on display for visitors to look at and hopefully purchase. The first floor is a continuation of the furniture shop and the top floor is a living space for the store keeper with the a bed, small kitchen & dining area.
A tale as old as time
Every interesting building has a story behind it. This is no different. The seamstress, carpenter and store keeper all grew up together in Silkwood Street. The carpenter & storekeeper are brothers who are both secretly in love with the seamstress since they were teens. Now one holds a ring made of wood, the other holds a ring made of gold. How this story continues on will depend on the creator who builds it.
The design
The design of the 3 buildings tries to find a balance between being unique & stylish but having accessible pieces as much as possible. Whenever possible, 1x6x5 panels & 1x1x5 bricks would be used if they would not affect the overall look to reduce the pieces required to build. The use of most of the pieces from Hagrid’s hut (75947) and several 40120 sets would make it easier for creators to collect the parts. There are still many parts to be acquired aside from the previously mentioned sets but most of them are common and easily accessible. Most pieces can also be replaced with alternate colors whichever is available in the creator’s collection
Further improvements & customization
The MOC set has been designed with allowance for further improvement & customization. The seamstress’ attic has been left without any items but with a removable panel. As every LEGO fan would know, attics (and basements) have one main purpose: to be turned into a LEGO room. It would depend on the creator on what theme they would want to put in the attic. Additional small built appliances & furniture can also be added in each room to make them more dense and add further details. The exterior looks complete but can also be customized. The round tiles which serve to look like rocks, could be changed to gray tiles to better fit the set with other modular buildings. Like any other official set/MOC, one’s imagination is limitless on what can be done with this set.

Modular moc building