A Swedish developer by the name of Einar Öberg has created a Lego-style version of Google Maps (not actually affiliated with Google), which renders city streets the world over in a blocky style that could be construed as Lego-like—or what Legos would look like if they had been smeared with a mess o' Kragle and then blurred partially by an overzealous censor. Anyway, as CityLab notes, you can test-drive this familiar-strange landscape over in Brick Street View, and despite the lack of Legosimilitude, it's fun to see what the software does with San Francisco's twisty streets. As you might expect, Brick Street View cannot compute curvy Lombard Street, and just renders it as a blank gray block pocked with green egg-trees. Honestly, we're none too surprised, given that our city's topography is a proven pain point even for real Google developers.
Somehow Danielle Steel's formidable hedge looks less monolithic and solid than it does in real life, though it does still thoroughly conceal the architecture of master builder George Applegarth from us workaday Brickowskis.
Meanwhile, Coit Tower is a total mess.
Is that the Transamerica Pyramid?
Naturally, the intense, street-blocking home renovation undertaken by Lord Business is also invisible to Brick Street View.
· Brick Street View [Official Site]
· Turn Your City Into Legos With 'Brick Street View' [CityLab]
· In Google Maps' Pac-Man, Lombard Street Is a Death Trap [Curbed SF]
· Here Now, a Photo Tribute to Danielle Steel's Enormous Hedge [Curbed SF]
· Mark Zuckerberg's Insane Reno Caught on Google Street View [Curbed SF]