Why Ohsojang's The Alley Tea Shop 10208 is my favorite Lego compatible modular building in 2023

Greetings brick fans and welcome back to It's Not Lego!

Today I'd like to introduce to you the latest modular building in my collection. It was designed by Ohsojang who is well known in the Lego community for his unique and exquisitely designed contemporary modular buildings.

These are just some of Ohsojangs modular building creations.  His modern MOC designs can be found on Rebrickable and his sets have been reproduced by various Lego alternative brick brands such as Mould King, Cada, and Urge to name a few.

As you can see Ohsojang buildings have a very unique style that is immediately recognizable as his own.  So I was super delighted when Afobrick.com asked me to review Ohsojang's recent Alley Milk Tea shop by Mork, set number 10208.  This is an authorised collaboration between Ohsojang and Mork brand.

If you are interested in getting this set, please check it out over at Afobrick.com. Here's the direct link to the product listing.

Afobrick.com have a great selection of Lego compatible brick sets and they offer free shipping worldwide.

They've graciously given me a 5% discount code to pass on to my viewers, just use code ITSNOTLEGO at checkout for your entire purchase.

Let's now take a look at the particulars of this awesome set.

• Set Name and Number: The Deers/Alley 10208
• Brand: Mork
• Theme: Modular Building
• Piece count: 3423 pieces
• Numbered bags? Yes
• Stickers or printed parts? Printed
• Missing or deformed pieces: No
• Extra parts: Yes
• Minifigures: No
• Lighting kit: LED light string
• Brick Quality and Clutch: Excellent
• Measurements (approx): 36.9cm(L) x 37.6cm(W) x 44cm(H)
• Age Rating: 6+

Unboxing

Unpacking the set, there are numerous bags, a 32x32 baseplate, some smaller brick plates and a battery powered LED light string.

I counted a total of 70 bags of parts numbered 1 through 7.  Here's the breakdown of bags for each numbered section.

1 - 11 bags

2 - 10 bags

3 - 11 bags

4 - 5 bags

5 - 14 bags

6 - 12 bags

7 - 7 bags

The instruction booklet is quite thick with 163 pages broken down into corresponding 7 major sections.

Following are the highlights of each section of the build.

Section 1 - The Tea Station

I have to keep reminding myself that this is a Milk Tea or Bubble Tea shop and not a Coffee shop, because there are so many modular building creations that are coffee shops. According to Ohsojang, this modular MOC was inspired by a tea shop he saw in Danang, Vietnam.  There is a global brand of Milk Tea shops called the Alley which features a deer in the brand's logo.  Probably because they didn't/couldn't get licensing for the Alley brand, the Mork set is called The Deers.

The great thing about this set is all of the printed pieces you get such as menu boards, mugs, cups and other signage.  These are not generic Lego printed pieces, but rather custom printed pieces exclusively for this set.

Here is the tea station which is rich in details.  Note that this is actually a set within the larger set.  You have the option of displaying the tea set on it's own and it comes with it's own custom base.  I've never seen this unique feature in any other Lego or alt Lego set.

When you are done displaying the tea station, you can remove it from the base and add it back into the modular building.

Section 2 - Construction of the first floor

I decided to fabricate a raised baseplate for the Tea shop to give it extra stability when moving it around. I've been slowly converting all of my other modular buildings to raised baseplates as well.

Here's one of the cool designs that grace the interior walls of the tea shop.

More printed parts!

The tea shop interior has white tiled floors with 4 circular stools for seating at each of the two counters. There's two corner walls of expansive floor to ceiling windows. The deer head logo on the floor is composed of 9 printed tiles.

Here's the integration of the tea station into the first floor of the building.  Outside the walkways are tiled off.  Although this set doesn't come with any minifigures, I'ved a add a few of my own to provide a sense of scale to the shop.  As you can see the minifigures look perfect in the setting.

Section 3 - Finishing the 1st Floor

We will finish building the first floor in this step.  Interior accessories include a decorative tree fronting the two storey window, a merch rack and a small table for extra cups and sweetener.

The stairwell connects the first floor to the soon to be constructed second floor.

All of the little landscaping details are added outside including a fire hydrant, foliage, a brick built lamp post, some small tables and a tree whose colour scheme I really like.  It uses olive green leaves paired with dark orange branches.  I like it so much that I plan to plant more trees like these throughout my city.  I'm going to buy the parts from webrick.com.

So if you are wondering why there is a pair of wings attached to the back of the shop, I think it must be one of those places where people take pictures for their social media accounts.

Here's how I imagine a typical day at the angel wing photo spot.  Because I've built the tea shop on a raised base plate, I might end up relocating the wings to the front of the building in the near future, so that a platform is not needed to reach the wings.

The first floor is now complete and we can move on to the next step.

Section 4 - The Stairwell

I really like the creativity Ohsojang used to make the cantilevered windows.  The little blue bubbles in the adjacent windows are cool too.

We find more printed parts on the stairwell windows.

Check out this large 4x4 printed piece with the Deers logo and the words "It's time for tea".  I'm so happy no stickers were used in this set.

The enclosure for the stairwell is finished and attached to the building.

Section 5 - Building the Second Floor

Here is the interestingly designed staircase that goes from the second floor to the rooftop.

The surprises keep coming with this opening in the second floor wall. 

And check out this curved table, wow!

The second floor of the tea shop is almost complete. With all the windows, the building feels very light and airy.  The Alley namesake sign gets mounted to the second floor.

Section 6 -

Just as the first floor gets a removable diorama, the second floor lounge seating area is removable as well.  A few more printed parts can be found on the cups and table top.

After you build it, you can display it separately outside or tuck it back into the building.

What a clever design!  The swivel piece locks the diorama into place while the handle facilitates it's removal from the structure.

The last bit of exterior cladding is now added to the side of the tea shop.

Section 7 - Constructing the roof

Nothing about this tea shop is boring and that includes the roof.  It has a small patio that is accessed by the staircase.

The patio is covered in vines and foliage. A railing wraps all the way around the roof to keep minifigures safe.

The giant skylight lets a lot of natural light into the second floor but since it's not cordoned off, it means it has to support the weight of anyone who is standing on it.

Gallery

I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves.  The Deers tea shop looks great from every angle.

Lighting the Deers/Alley Tea Shop

Mork includes a battery powered LED light strand to put inside the tea shop.  It is meant to light up both the first and second floors.  I used the original light exclusively on the first floor and added an additional light strand to the second floor and in doing so, I was able to light up the Alley sign on the roof as well.

Although I didn't use it, there is a secret compartment under the second floor staircase. I think it is where you can place the battery brick for the light strand.

I should also let you know about the secret drawer in the first floor stairwell as well.  All sorts of surprises in this set!

Final Thoughts

The Mork Deers/Alley Tea Shop by MOC designer Ohsojang is one of the most detailed modular buildings I've ever built.  With over 3400 pieces, this set did not disappoint in terms of novel building techniques or brick quality.  Every step was a joy to build with something new to be discovered along the way.

The removable dioramas were really fun to build and I definitely learned some new techniques to use in future modular MOCs.  With all the printed pieces that came with this set at it's affordable price point, the Milk tea shop is way ahead of anything Lego would ever do.

I enthusiastically give this set a 5 out of 5 and highly recommend the Mork model Milk Tea Shop to anyone who is a fan of Ohsojang's creations or loves to build Lego style modular buildings.   I think this might be the first time I've ever assigned a perfect score to a set!

Let me know what you thought of this model and don't forget to use my code ITSNOTLEGO on the Afobrick.com website to help you save some money.

Thanks for looking, bye!

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. 

Want to see more JMBricklayer set reviews?  Check them out at https://bricktoyreviews.blogspot.com.

Bye for now!