FascinationsMetal Earth Premium Series Harry Potter Hogwarts Castle in Snow 3D Metal Model Kit

I bought this as a gift for my husband who loves puzzles, but hasn't done a model since his teens when he made the typical plastic cars and planes everyone did. I did see the warning that this required special tools (tiny! My jeweler's tools) and required expertise (and magnifying glass). I understood how tiny this model is I would not have bought it but we would then have missed out. It took my husband a couple weeks to assemble this, and certainly there were moments of frustration, but it is now complete and simply gorgeous. We both love it, though the challenge was far above what I anticipated throwing in his lap. Now that this trial by fire has been completed successfully I am looking through the Metal Earth line to see what else they have to entertain him during Covid Isolation.

This model is not for beginners and is difficult to assemble, but I knew that when I bought it. It is a beautiful rendition of Hogwarts and even though this is the 4th model I have done and no expert, I think I didn't do too badly. Just don't rush, be patient, and when in doubt, go look at the finished pictures and 360 view on the Metal Earth website. Also, have some glue available because the parts I broke were never the duplicates:) I actually recommend this model as long as you know from the beginning it is challenging and not an afternoon or even weekend project, and if you are a huge fan of Harry Potter memorabilia. I'm thinking about buying another one maybe later on when I get better at cones which are very plentiful in the model and my weakest point. You might want to invest in special cone templates, but I just used round nose pliers mostly, tweezers, and cuticle cutters? Have fun!

The entire HP collection of these are great. Lots of work but beautiful when completed. Expensive but great for an adult potter head

Very detailed. Probably not for young children or people who are easily discouraged, but very nice set.

I did a metal model ship that was super challenging and detailed. I knew by looking at this, that it wouldn't be as challenging as the other, but I was hoping it would be fun. It is sort of bland. Some of the metal is so pliable that it bends out of shape when you don't want it to, and other metal, like all of the spires, are so rigid, to get them to look decent takes more time than it should. Once it was complete, I was like, meh, it sort of looks like Hogwarts I guess. I was just underwhelmed by the finished product and it wasn't that much fun to put together. Depends on what you are looking for when you get this product. If you want something to put on display where people go wow, then this isn't it. If you want to just fool around with a metal model that looks like Hogwarts when you are finished, then this might be for you.

I absolutely love putting these metal models together. It’s definitely not an easy build and a lot of small parts. Not for a beginner. The final product is gorgeous, even with the minor mistakes I made.

The pieces are very difficult to place together and then the perforated pieces may break with pressure. But, if you can make it past the original frustrations, and use super-glue some as you go, sticking through it and seeing it come together is very satisfying.

Definitely much harder than expected (I forgot to look at the difficulty before starting it), but it’s been super fun, we just work on it a couple mins a day in between other stuff. It’s been super cool seeing it slowly take shape. The accuracy is very good, being able to see it in 3D online also helps to see how it’s supposed to look

Es de nivel superior y se necesitan herramientas básicas (alicate pequeño y pinzas pequeñas) para recortar las piezas y moldearlas. Muy recomendable, aunque reitero que es de nivel superior.

I had fun doing it, but damn some of the pieces were so small that it made little sense to me, for accuracy reason, to even include it in the model. Also the instructions have a lot to desire, even with a pdf file of them, when the steps are poorly designed and don't even give you a picture of how it should look well, you end up like me with parts that didn't fit at the very end because I assembled one small brige in the wrong direction and therefore the angle of one of the buildings was not correct. I managed to remove and put back in the small section and then everything lined up correctly. Also be careful, the metal breaks more easily than you think, so I had to use some glue in order to be able to complete the set.

Tal y como pone en las indicaciones, es de dificultad alta, tiene mucho trabajo y minucioso.La única pega que le pongo es que alguna pieza no está bien troquelada y es muy difícil de encajar correctamente.

I am excited to build this and the details already look amazing. The down side is it it expensive. So when the package came damages and opened (not the shipping package but the actual product package) I was disappointed.

This was not the first metal earth model that I have done, it is the first one that I did not complete. The instructions are not clear and at times confusing. One piece snapped at the fold during folding. I gave up and it is now in the recycle bin. Definitely not for a first time builder.