A father and daughter have built a wearable replica of the Sutton Hoo helmet using more than 1,000 Lego bricks.
Andrew Webb, 45, and his 11-year-old daughter Tilda, of Saffron Walden in Essex, have submitted their design to the website Lego Ideas and hope the toymaker will consider it as an official Lego set to put on sale.
They said they were in part inspired to take on the lockdown project by Netflix drama The Dig, about the excavation of the Great Ship Burial at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk in 1939.
The Sutton Hoo helmet is one of just four known complete examples from Anglo-Saxon England. It is thought to have been produced in the late 6th or early 7th century.
The original is kept at the British Museum.
Mr Webb said of their Lego project: “Like a lot of people, we were looking for a meaningful project to keep us busy during lockdown that wasn’t baking banana bread.”
When it was found in 1939, the original helmet was in hundreds of tiny pieces and was painstakingly pieced together by British Museum conservator Nigel Williams.
“That’s exactly like a Lego set, only with no instructions to follow,” said Mr Webb.
“The helmet is one of Britain’s most important artefacts, and its ancient and recent history is such an inspirational story.”
Mr Webb focused on making the helmet while Tilda added Lego figures of excavator Basil Brown and landowner Edith Pretty, as well as King Raedwald, who the helmet is believed to have belonged to.
The build has been submitted to fan site Lego Ideas where creators submit their builds and the public can vote for them.
The helmet has received more than 600 votes of support and if it reaches the milestone of 10,000 votes then Lego may make it into an official set.
To vote, see http://bit.ly/LEGOSuttonHoo
