The JMBricklayer 21102 Coffee Shop Set Review, It's Lego compatible

 It's review time at It's Not Lego and today, we will take a closer look at the JMBricklayer 21102 Coffee shop!

Update:  I modified the Coffee shop to fit my modular city!  Check out my mods here:  https://bricksandfigs.blogspot.com/2023/04/i-completely-rebuilt-jmbricklayer.html

Where to Get it

Today's set was generously provided to me by JMBricklayer.com for the purpose of the review.  

Get it from their web store, on sale right now.

Or from the JMBricklayer Amazon store (discount coupon).

For other non sale items, use my code ITSNOTLEGO15% to save 15% in the JMBricklayer web store.

Coffee Shop Details

• Brand: JMBricklayer
• Set: Coffee Shop 21102
• Theme: City Architecture
• Piece count: 1512 pieces
• Numbered bags? Yes
• Stickers or printed parts? Both
• Missing or deformed pieces: Yes
• Extra parts: Yes
• Minifigures: No
• Lighting kit: included
• Brick Quality and Clutch: Great
• Measurements (approx): 8"W x 6" D x 7.5" H
• Age Rating: 14+

Unboxing

Here's a look at what we get in the box.  Various bags of parts, an instruction manual and a small sticker sheet.  Not sure why they spelled Coffee as Coffe, both on the manual and on the printed parts.

Here's my inventory of parts bags corresponding to the steps in the manual:

step 1: 10 bags

step 2:  9 bags

step 3:  8 bags

plus one LED light strand and battery pack.

Step 1 Highlights

Assembling the base of the coffee shop.

Ooh, we got some printed parts including some milk containers, some coffee cups with logos on them, a cookie, a payment terminal and a couple of records.

Here's the coffee counter setup with room for a barista minifigure which is sadly not included.  Love the cookie jar, the coffee maker, and the coffee grinder.

Step 1 finished.  The scale of the front door doesn't match the scale of the interior, it's way too big.  It's something I'll want to fix at a later date.  The owner of the coffee shop must love the sound of old school vinyl records.

Step 2 Highlights

More printed parts! Some more cups and cookies as well as some wall art and a clock.

Interesting concept of having a giant tree inside your coffee shop.  

Now we see that all those printed pieces are placed into the adjacent seating area.  The hinged wall makes it so much easier to take pictures of the inside.

Step 3 Highlights

Misprinted signs.  Would have preferred if it said Coffee Shop instead.

Main building is complete.

Roof 1 covers the counter area and gets a nice skylight.

Roof 2 covers the tree and seating area but didn't come with any glass panes.  I wonder if this was a case of missing parts or was it designed not to have any glass in the roof.

Exterior accessories include a lamp post and a shelving unit full of plants.

The completed Coffee Shop!

The side less frequented.

Overhead view.

Bonus Pictures

The JMBricklayer Coffee shop doesn't come with any minifigures, so I added a few of my own.   Here's Betty the barista.  And there's that one sticker which is the menu board.

Shift change at the coffee counter.  Ted has come in for the night shift.

Betty takes a break before heading home, after a long day at the shop.

Now that Betty has left, Ted can play his favourite Barry Manilow songs on the record player.

Er, not everyone is a fan of Barry Manilow, sorry Ted.

Can't forget that the Coffee shop comes with an LED light string.  There's no right or wrong way to place the light strand, so I just weave it around randomly inside.

Summary

The JMBricklayer 21102 Coffee Shop set was a lot of fun to build and makes a nice addition to your building block collection, especially if you like these little shops that open up to display the detailed interior.

The bricks used were excellent quality and had great clutch as evidenced by my pictures. I really liked all the nice details behind the coffee counter and the record player was a cool bonus.  The plant stand outside was nice to have but probably wasn't really necessary.

The large tree in the sitting area provided a nice canopy for the coffee shop patrons. This set came with a lot of printed parts like coffee cups, wall art, and signage, however the menu board behind the coffee counter was a sticker.

Play value is good because you can open up the shop to display and place your own minifigures with ease. And because the bricks are Lego compatible, you can display it with all of of your other Lego and alternative brick sets.  The included LED light string is something you definitely don't get in any Lego set.

The set is not perfect though.  The entrance door is way too large for the shop despite the interior being minifigure scale.  The rooftop over the sitting area didn't come with any glass panes, so you wouldn't want to be sitting there during a rainstorm.

Let's not forget the glaring spelling mistake for Coffee on the signage either.  

Rating

Going over all the pluses and minuses, I'll give this set a rating of 4.3.  I would have rated it higher if the spelling on the sign was correct, the roof glass included, a standard sized door was used and maybe one or two minifigures included with the set.

Thanks again JMBricklayer.com for the set.  Please visit their website or their Amazon store if you get a chance. Bye for now!