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A North Park resident has spent the pandemic recreating micro versions of his favorite San Diego buildings. Ben Smith's North Park Lego project started in the spring of last year when he posted his first model to Instagram, Tribute Pizza.
The models are made out of Legos and his creations were such a hit among locals and former San Diego residents that he's set to hold an exhibition to raise money for Feeding San Diego and Youth FarmWorks.
Smith told San Diego Magazine this specific hobby started when he would build Harry Potter Lego sets with his kids during the early days of the pandemic. “I thought, ‘My kids love Harry Potter; wouldn’t it be great to re-create Hogwarts?’ I had no idea there was a whole community doing this exact same thing on a much grander scale. Anything I thought of had already been done about 20 times, and way better than anything I could do,” he said. "I knew I wanted to do something a bit more personal, and building my family’s favorite places around North Park, the places we missed most during the shutdown, seemed like just the thing."