We always love putting together a Ravensburger 3D puzzle - so far, we have made Tower Bridge, Big Ben, The Empire State Building and a Medieval House and they were all great fun to build and looked spectacular. When we received The Eiffel Tower to add to our collection, it got an ever bigger squeal of excitement because this one is "by night" so it has clever light effects to really set it off.
If you've never done one of the 3D puzzles before, here's what you get in the box - a bag of plastic puzzle pieces, the plastic accessories for the architectural details and some internal supports. This one also comes with an LED light box to put in the stand to illuminate it from below.
Many of the puzzle pieces are hinged and need to be folded until they click into place at right angles. The puzzle pieces are also numbered with arrows showing you where the next piece must be attached, making the whole construction job much easier.
Pierre helped me out by sifting through the pieces to find pieces with two numbers on, then pieces that start with a 1 then a 2 - great practice of maths and observation skills there !
Once the pieces are all lined up in order, it's fairly quick and simple slotting them all into place. The 3D structure rapidly grows before your eyes which is very exciting !
Juliette arrived just in time to help with putting it all together.
It wasn't very clear on the box whether or not the batteries were included - they aren't, you'll need to supply 3 AAA batteries to get the light effects. I also thought the light box was badly designed because you have to take the Eiffel Tower structure off the light box stand to change from white light to colour-changing mode or to switch off the lights - a delicate move which could be disastrous if you smash all your hard work to pieces by accident !
It looks pretty spectacular by day, because the light shines through the transparent internal struts between levels - but is even prettier once it starts getting dark. The colour change mode is really effective and had the kids mesmerised !
It was a lovely Sunday afternoon project that the whole family could get involved in and which took about an hour and a half to complete.
star rating : 4.5/5
RRP : £24.99
Disclosure : We received the product in order to write an honest review.
This looks fantastic, my children would love one of these, I love the way it lights up too.
ReplyDeleteWow looks really good!
ReplyDeleteAshleigh
looks amazing, fab lights
ReplyDeleteA really good family project but you have to have a lot of room.
ReplyDeleteit doesn't take up much room actually, the Tower Bridge one was bigger !
DeleteWow, looks spectacular indeed. I'm just finishing the 3d Eiffel Tower, but without any visual effects, just a "normal" puzzle.
ReplyDeleteDrop me a link to your review when you've finished and I'll give you a mention :)
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