| 05.28.2020 - LEGO® has been known for its colorful and innovative construction themed toys to popular licensed sets based on Star Wars and other properties.
But majority of those who would acquire these sets won't notice the packaging design or the box art that it's more exciting to build the sets to notice it. There's a lot that goes into producing a themed set like Ninjago or the Star Wars sets. |
The Danish toy company is not just about what they put out in the market they are also defined with their colorful boxes from the simple product image of the content of the box they also embrace that comes with art that is now staple in the brand’s identity with so many sets being produced by LEGO® you might hardly noticed it until now.
Meet Ian Sta. Maria, he is a Senior Concept Artist at LEGO® which most who would buy the sets will notice his work or his other colleagues who is part of the Design Innovation Team. Ian has been working with LEGO® since 2013 and has been one of the people behind the box art of the set that you might have purchased.
Now based in Billund he started as an illustrator of graphic novels in the Philippines and he recently did a live-stream interview with Spot.PH about his early beginnings as a struggling artist to working in the biggest toy company in the world. He was promoting his most recent book “Salamangka” (“Magic” in English) with Summit Media that was released in September 2019.
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| "Salamangka" released in September 2019 is comprised of Philippine Mythology themed artwork by Ian Sta. Maria |
Ian is still a big comicbook fan and also a huge Star Wars fan as his room adorns original trilogy posters with some interesting displays like a Stormtrooper helmets and a Yoda pillow. During the course of the interview he did mentioned that he worked on some of the Star Wars sets since his fellow colleague Mervin Ignacio is the Senior Creative Director of the Star Wars team for the past two years. Mervin also worked with the Nexo Knights theme but that’s another story to share.
Mervin and Ian go back as they both creators one of the best-selling graphic novels in the Philippines with “Skyworld” a Filipino Mythology series that is still popular to this day that the books are now out of print.
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| Mervin Ignacio & Isa Sta. Maria co-created the Skyworld a Philippine Mythology graphic novel. |
Ian explains his job description at LEGO® as a Senior Concept Artist is he sits down with LEGO® Master Builders and he does sketches with his art style and the Master Builder translate it the builders will translate it into LEGO® or vice versa.
For those curious what were the themed sets Ian did work on at LEGO® was revealed last year during a panel at Komikon when he launched his book. He revealed working on the artwork for the “Elves” sets and some from The LEGO® Movie 2 sets with the emphasis that his contribution was drawing the moon at the background which featured Benny’s sets from the said theme.
His latest contribution for LEGO® was revealed towards the end of the interview and that is the Monkie Kid, which just recently debut and its available now in selected countries. Ian revealed working on the box art and its packaging and he’s excited for the next projects down the road aside from finalizing the release of the sequel to “Salamanka” which will be out soon.
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