Creative Play by Design: Isaac’s Internship with LEGO
Senior Isaac Watkins secured a coveted semester-long internship with the LEGO Group in Billund, Denmark. There, he’s utilizing his background in industrial design to explore prototyping, designing new LEGO elements, and brainstorming the next big play idea.
When industrial design student Isaac Watkins first heard about LEGO’s internships from a friend in the college’s materials lab, it was only three days before the application deadline. In that time frame, he managed to pull together a portfolio of his best personal projects, including a LEGO build. Within two weeks, he had completed his virtual interview and been accepted into the program as a Play Invention & Prototypes intern.
“My role is in the Creative Play Lab (CPL), a very capable group of craftspeople, engineers, additive manufacturing specialists and print technicians whose job is creating models and realizing new ideas from across the LEGO Group. CPL as a whole focuses on discovering new forms of play, and integrating those findings into the LEGO system,” Watkins says.
“Some days I could be working with a team to design a new LEGO element, and the next I could be machining an aluminum part in the workshop, or even just creating a new play idea with LEGO bricks,” he adds.
Throughout the spring semester, Watkins has utilized what he has learned through the industrial design program at NC State – designing for a specific need, receiving constructive criticism, a strong ability to learn and adapt, and developing his own creativity – to better serve in his internship role.
“This role, as many roles for industrial designers can be, can be non-linear and ever-changing. Learning quickly and being able to shift your focus can be extremely valuable, which the College of Design prepared me for,” he says.
Watkins has spent his days learning about not only the processes for manufacturing LEGO, such as 3D modeling, additive manufacturing for prototypes and model building, but also exploring his creative side. He’s had the opportunity to contribute to fast-pace creative sprints and personal curiosity projects with fellow interns from around the world.
“It’s truly been an amazing experience,” he says. “I’ve been able to collaborate with people across many departments in LEGO, which has been so enriching. I’ve also learned, with LEGO’s ethos of Play above all, to not take myself so seriously all the time. Sometimes us designers need to commit to a project for no other reason than ‘this makes the kid in me happy.’”
