Tākina launches with hands-on Lego Jurassic Park exhibition

It seems fitting Wellington's mammoth new convention centre, Tākina, is set to launch with the largest Lego exhibition to come to New Zealand.

Six million plastic bricks have been used for dinosaurs, props, and even that famous Jeep for a step inside the Jurassic World universe.

Certified Lego professional Ryan McNaught, also known as 'The Brickman', had been working on the idea for a while before reaching out to Universal Studios which made the movies to see if they would collaborate.

"I always ask people when I meet them here, what would you love to see made out of Lego? What have you never seen? What would be super cool? And any eight-year-old girl and boy, their instant first answer is dinosaurs," McNaught said.

More than two years and 10,000 build hours have gone into the creation by McNaught, making it the biggest exhibition his team has ever created.

To enter the exhibition, a visitor must push through two large Lego gates to reach the beginning of Jurassic Park, then onto the laboratory, baby dinosaur centre, passing by enormous Lego creations along the way.

McNaught said the exhibition was unique because it was completely interactive - meaning children could put their hands on the dinosaurs.

"I couldn't think of anything more torturous than allowing kids to a Lego exhibition if they weren't allowed to touch Lego, that would be horrendous."

The level of detail in the film was also important.

"We even had to get things like, is the licence plate correct? Is the odometer on the Jeep, right? All these kind of little things like that mean a lot."

It was a tight competition on whether to launch it in Australia or New Zealand, but this country emerged on top.

"I don't want to get too controversial, but there's a battle going on between who's better at Lego - Aussie kids or Kiwi kids. And it was proved to me when we were last year, at Te Papa, that it's Kiwi kids, so we had to come back and see if they've still got the crown," the Australian said.

The biggest feature in the exhibition is the T-rex which starred in one the most memorable scenes in the first Jurassic Park movie, when it chased the Jeep.

Weighing in at 1.5 tonnes and made up of more than 128,000 pieces of Lego, the T-rex alone took 1235 hours to complete.

"I actually got a few stitches from her, I bumped my head onto one of her teeth. I had to go to a hospital and the doctor didn't believe me that it was a dinosaur that causes stitches," McNaught said.

Since then the teeth have been child-proofed.

"In fact, that's what is so unusual about our Lego exhibition. It's quite hands on. So you basically get to come and cuddle a T-rex, not often you get to say that."

Even Mayor Tory Whanau was on board.

"To walk through this exhibition is super exciting. I'll admit, I wasn't a huge Lego fan before I walked into this exhibition, but it is absolutely thrilling," Whanau said.

First exhibition for Tākina

It is the first exhibition to take place in Wellington's long-awaited convention centre, Tākina, and will open on Saturday.

Wellington City Council said there were now more than 100 bookings for events, some as far ahead as 2028.

It was the most significant new building to open in Wellington since Sky Stadium was built two decades ago, Whanau said.

"It's going to bring in a half a million visitors into the city. That's going to have a significant impact on accommodation providers, our hospitality scene, our transport scene, and will really allow even international investors [to see] how worthy it is to invest in our city," Whanau said this evening.

The first floor of the building has large conference and exhibition space, which is where the Lego exhibition has been set up, and the top floor has an even larger conference space.

The site can hold more than 5000 people at once and is spread over 930 square metres. The largest space can hold 1600 people.