2022 LEGO Chinese New Year sets officially revealed!

November 6, 2021 | 2

LEGO have officially revealed its 2022 Chinese New Year sets – 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions and 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival.

Update: My review of 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions is now up!

These new sets, which commemorate the Year of the Tiger have a release date of 25 December 2021 for China and the Asia Pacific region, before other countries globally get them on 1 January 2022.

These LEGO Chinese New Year sets being available on LEGO.com, LEGO Stores and most specialty toy retailers.

Update: Here are the release dates, and local regional pricing of the 2022 LEGO Chinese New Year sets. To see more photos, check out this post.

80108 Lunar New Year Traditions

• LEGO 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions [US] – US$79.99 (10 January 2022)
• LEGO 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions [AUS] – AU$109.99 (1 January 2022)
• LEGO 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions [UK] – £59.99 (26 December 2021)
• LEGO 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions [EU] – €69.99 (26 December 2021)
• LEGO 80108 Lunar New Year Traditions [CAN] – CA$99.99 (10 January 2022)

80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival

• LEGO 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival [US] – US$119.99 (10 January 2022)
• LEGO 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival [AUS] – AU$149.99 (1 January 2022)
• LEGO 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival [UK] – £89.99 (26 December 2021)
• LEGO 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival [EU] – €99.99 (26 December 2021)
• LEGO 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival [CAN] – CA$149.99 (10 January 2022)

These sets were revealed at the 4th annual China International Import Expo (CIEE) in Shanghai.

A promotional video featuring both sets was also released on LEGO’s Wechat:

Here’s a closer look at the sets.

80108 Lunar New Year Traditions

80108 Lunar New Year Traditions is a really neat vignette-style build, with different modules that are inspired by LEGO Minifigure Habitats.

Each module captures different Chinese New Year traditions, cleaning the house, visiting grandparents, going to the shops, and in particular, a module contains the Chinese God of Prosperity minifigure, complete with a red packet, and gold ingot cleverly made out of hotdog buns.

Check it out in action twirling here.

They look like they can be displayed on their side, or stacked into a pyramid, which makes for a great display piece!

Here’s a quick explanation of the tiers.

Top Tier – Chinese New Year is all about wishing wealth and prosperity to each other. The minifigure depicted here is Caishen, the God of Money/Prosperity, and he is often worshipped in hopes that he’ll bless you with wealth in the new year.

Middle Tier – The left habitat sees preparation for Chinese New Year underway, with banners and sticker greetings being hung up on the entrances, as well as a mandarin tree. Mandarins are significant because the Chinese word “kam” is a homonym for mandarin, and gold, so the act of giving mandarins as a gift is akin to giving gold to each other.

The right habitat is the Chinese New Year tradition of visiting grandparents, who will gift red packets filled with money to children, and the unmarried. I LOVE the little LEGO paper bag in this module!

Bottom Tier – on the right is the couple from 80107 Spring Lantern Festival, who again are in matching outfits. The girl looks like she’s cleaning their home, an important custom because you do not sweep on Chinese New Year, as you might sweep away your prosperity and good luck. The man is also seen holding a colourful feather duster.

The middle module sees a traditional Chinese stall, selling toys and figurines on sticks, and the right module sees the family from 80101 Chinese New Year’s Eve Dinner watching variety shows on TV, staying up late (the clock shows 11:59pm) as they await the New Year!

Here’s a look at the box, and instructions. It seems like LEGO has designed this to be a “build together” affair, with different instruction manuals for different segments of the build – great for families looking to build together!

80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival

Up next is 80109 Lunar New Year Ice Festival, which seems inspired by the Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival which features a really lovely festive scene, along with a multitude of characters.

The set also comes with the Year of the Tiger Zodiac minifigure!

Here are more closeup photos of the set, via Wooden Duck which gives you a better look at the set. Is that a nod Perry the Platypus??

I am most in love with the large opalescent tiles used for the ice skating rink, and the adorable tiger cutouts, as well as the cart selling Roasted Chestnuts, a popular roadside delicacy in China and Asia.

LEGO Monkie Kid Galactic Explorer

In addition to these Chinese New Year sets. LEGO also unveiled an upcoming 2022 Monkie Kid set, the Monkie Kid Galactic Explorer!

These images are pretty low-res as I screenshotted them from the live stream, but fingers crossed we get more high resolution official images soon!

Update: More hi-res and detailed photos of the Monkie Kid Galactic Explorer have been revealed!

More LEGO Super Mario 2022 sets

Update: more photos of the new LEGO Super Mario 2022 sets have been revealed!

This is LEGO’s fourth year in a row, producing minifigure sets that celebrate the Lunar New Year

Here are some of LEGO’s previous Chinese New Year / Spring Festival sets that I’ve reviewed on the blog:

• 2019 80101 Chinese New Year’s Eve Dinner (review)
• 2019 80102 Dragon Dance
• 2019 80103 Dragon Boat Festival (review)
• 2020 80104 Lion Dance (review)
• 2020 80105 Chinese New Year Temple Fair
• 2021 80106 Story of Nian (review)
• 2021 80107 Spring Lantern Festival (review)
• 2021 Duplo 10943 Happy Childhood Moments (review)

In addition to these minifigure sets, we’ll also likely get a Year of the Tiger Chinese Zodiac Animal promotional gift with purchase set. These have been going on for much longer (2021’s Zodiac Animal was the Year of the Ox), and the Tiget will be the 7th entry into the series.

We’re almost at the end of the 12 year cycle to collect all the Chinese Zodiac Animals! Only half a decade more to go!

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