Stunning 1926 Rolls-Royce Phantom Is So Exquisite You'll Never Guess It's a LEGO

The story that might just do that does not start with a maker of plastic brick toys from Denmark, but with the maker of luxurious automobiles from the UK. One called Rolls-Royce, the present-day seller of Phantoms, Spectres, Ghosts, and of course Cullinans.

Long before it got to expand the offering of vehicles named after the supernatural manifestations of our world, Rolls-Royce was making just one of them, the Phantom. The first version of the model, which was to be the replacement of the Silver Ghost, was introduced into this world in 1925, and managed to stay in production until 1931, during which time a little over 2,200 of them were made.

Alternatively called 40/50 Phantom I, it is perhaps one of the best representations of what people took for luxury back then. That means both in terms of exterior design, but also when it comes to interior appointments.

That's because back then, as it often happens now when it comes to high-end products, the customer had a big say on how the car would eventually be specced. Unlike now, though, customers mostly got the rolling chassis, and the coachwork and everything else had to be made elsewhere.

That reality led to the creation of some truly exquisite Phantoms, some of which are still fighting for attention and big bucks at auction events in our day and age. Such an impressive version of the Phantom I is the variant that became known down the years as the Phantom of Love.

The car is perhaps one of the most impressive of all the 2,200 Phantoms ever made, and that is entirely owed to its first owner, an American called Clarence Warren Gasque, who had it made not for himself, but for his wife. The financial director of one of the world's first five-and-dime companies in the world, F W Woolworth, Gasque was also highly taken with antique French furniture, and that's more than obvious in the way the interior of the vehicle was shaped.

Don't go thinking stuff like leather and other elaborate soft materials, as this thing was commissioned to be more like "the throne room at Versailles than the interior of an automobile," as auction house Bonhams once said about it.

The rococo interior of the Phantom of Love is akin to a miniature salon, with satinwood veneer panels, painted decorations, and oval medallions. Why, there were even naked cherubs seen on the ceiling and in the corners of the light supports at the rear. Even the rear bench was styled in such a way as to resemble a sofa dressed in fine tapestries.

Naturally, the Phantom of Love became collectible as soon as Gasque's wife put it into storage after the man's death. That happened in 1937, and at the time the car was in a pretty bad shape.

It was, of course, rescued, and changed hands repeatedly, at one point for a sum that reached a staggering £1,000,000 ($1.262 million). Most recently, it sold in 2016 at a Bonhams auction, where it went for £561,500 ($709,000).

You may be wondering why I am bringing up the Phantom of Love and what it has to do with LEGO. To answer that as simply as I can: just look closely at the main photo of this piece, and you'll realize it's not the real thing, but a LEGO model. Even if it doesn't look like one.

That's right, someone very passionate about this particular Rolls-Royce Phantom managed to recreate it to the tiniest of details, including the curtains, clocks, vases, and storage boxes. The only thing that's missing is the six-cylinder engine that powered this amazing vehicle in real life.

We first stumbled upon this LEGO project three years ago, when its creator, someone who goes by the name Dimexart, was still trying to get the needed backing for the Danish toymaker to really take the design into consideration for production.

We decided to have a look at what the idea has been up to these past few years and guess what: the 1926 Rolls-Royce Phantom of Love managed to get 10,000 LEGO Ideas backers, and it is currently under review for possible production.

If it gets the green light (and the fact it's under review is no guarantee of that outcome), it will become the first Rolls in the LEGO offering, but most importantly, it will give all of us the chance to own a true piece of motoring history. Or, at least, 2,085 pieces of plastic bricks shaped like motoring history, because that's how many pieces went into this very un-LEGO LEGO build.