Best of BrickNerd - Article originally published November 18, 2022.

LEGO has announced the 10,001-piece 10307 UCS Christmas Tree, and BrickNerd was lucky enough to be sent an early copy ahead of the holidays! What follows is an epic stream-of-consciousness build journal of the life-size Ultimate Collectors Set while lighting and decorating it for Christmas.

Brown Paper Packages

Whoa, this Christmas tree box is huge! It won’t fit in my normal build area, so I’ve commandeered the kitchen table.

Peekaboo! I see you! Getting this box out of the other box is a two-man operation.

What a beautiful Christmas tree! I am so excited to build it, and look! It already came with the first present to put under the tree.

Here' an obligatory photo of the backside of the box. Hmmm, I wonder what side you open since there is no obvious top...

I chose the right--which was wrong. No inspiring English here. I wonder if it might be on the lefthand side.

Bingo! Chose the left side to open this awesome set with a fun teaser quote in English.

The three boxes have side printing of a blueprint-style rendition of the Christmas tree. Looks like we'll be working from the bottom up!

I know this set is big, but it already has tripled in size just from the boxes within boxes! Boxception!

Each of these sub boxes is big enough to be its own set... And I have "I Saw Three Ships" stuck in my head.

My work is cut out for me because the first box feels the lightest.

Yep, smell that Billund air! Let's see what's inside!

Speaking of paper, there are no paper bags to be found in this set, but the instructions come in a new recyclable cardboard sleeve. I opened all three boxes to know what I was getting into. Behold 74 bags.

I love books! This set comes with three of them, but they are surprisingly thin for the set’s large size.