Customer Reviews

CITIBLOCS Original Wooden Building Block Set - 300 Piece

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Ordered these for a Christmas gift. The 11-year old son and 5-year old daughter loved it, as well as both adult parents. Grandma enjoyed looking on as we variously competed and worked together on several projects. These are unfinished planks. I do not intend for my 2-year-old and infant to chew and/or suck on these, but you know how it goes... It is nice that I don't have to worry about chemical ingestion when the inevitable happens. My dogs are also partial to wood. One plank already has a couple teeth marks in it, but it did not splinter immediately or anything like that. I'm sure it would have been destroyed had we not been vigilant and caught the dog right away. The planks in our set were uniform. The planks fit exactly into the box, so you do need to put them away just so, but it is easy to tell if any of the 300 planks are missing without counting. With babies and dogs around, it gives me some peace of mind (kind of). I'm kind of a cheapskate, so I have put off a large wooden block purchase. I am glad I took the plunge, though, and would recommend it to any family for multigenerational fun.

I have two sons ages 8 & 6. We discovered CitiBlocs during a visit to a hands on science museum where they had a room with a thousand + blocks for the kids and their parents to build with. It was a huge hit with my boys and clearly people of all ages were addicted to these seemingly mundane blocks. Had it not been for this experience I would have not thought to purchase them. My boys love to build and make things with their hands particularly with Legos. When we surprised them with their own set of CitiBlocs they were thrilled. I recommend buying a minimum of 300 blocks to start with especially if you have more than one child, this way they don't argue over whose building to destroy so they can build some more. I suspect we will be ordering more blocks in the future. The set comes with an instruction book offering some neat ideas of things to build. It really is amazing at all the different types of structures you can make from a simple, rectangular shaped piece of wood.

I knew about Kapla blocks from the children's museum and wanted some for home, got seduced by the price of the citiblocs along with all the great reviews. I had high hopes for the blocks, but I have to say that I am very disappointed with the quality. First the accuracy is off, the length of the blocks does not match an integer number of widths which makes many of the designs unstable. In addition to this universal problem with the citiblocs, many of the blocks are warped, or twisted, or non-uniform thickness. To make large complex structures stable, you really need to sort the blocks which is not really a workable solution unless you toss the faulty blocks which kind of negates the price advantage. Made from a light pine, hard to imagine how these could not warp especially with humidity changes. I guess the Kapla "Marine pine" is more stable. I have not tried the Keva Maple blocks, but I would certainly expect the maple to be more stable than then light pine.

I was very pleased when I found these blocks, which compete with the much more expensive Keva and Kapla planks. I haven't used the Kapla product, but I first saw the Keva blocks at a children's museum, and found myself playing with them for a long time (and I'm 41). Like the Kevas, the CitiBlocs are very precisely made, which is crucial when attempting more complex constructions. These are made of pine, and aren't quite as smooth and "polished" feeling as the Keva planks (which are made of maple), but the cost-benefit advantage easily goes to the CitiBlocs, in my opinion. My wife, my friends and I all can't seem to help ourselves when these are scattered on the table in front of us. We just have to start building something!

Oh, and my 5-year-old son and his friends and cousins love them, too. It's very interesting to see the contrast between what the kids come up with compared to the adults. An excellent toy.

My boys received a 300 piece set of these for Christmas, & I'm not sure who has had more fun with them since, the boys or myself. They are so simplistic in design, yet they are responsible for countless hours of creative building in my house, & are one of the only toys that will keep the boys away from T.V. or video games. After bedtime, I'm guilty of pulling them out to see what I can build myself, this is definitely also a fun one for parents. However, yesterday my son decided to tackle the skyline design shown on the box, so we pulled out the booklet that comes with the blocks & set to work. After only 3 buildings, we ran out of blocks. The booklet clearly shows both a real picture & a drawing of the skyline, with a "300 blocks" caption. I realize this shouldn't seem like a big deal, but my son had put in about 2 hours of hard work & was very upset that he couldn't complete his project. After counting the blocks in the picture, we realized it would take just under two 300 piece sets to complete what this company claims can be done with one, which I feel is a pretty clear case of false advertisement. So yes, I would reccommend this product, but if you have an ambitious builder at home like we do, pick up more than one set.

CitiBlocs are a fantastic building experience for anyone - especially those student who love Legos and K'nex. The cool thing at CitiBlocs is that there are no connector pieces. Gravity and Friction are among the forces that hold the pieces together as you build. While the 300 piece set comes with some basic building ideas, it really is up to the individual to decide what they want to create and how it will take shape. I've made structure using this set that are taller than I am (over 6 ft.) and I've also made constructs that curves and contours to them.

I've built with both Keva Planks and CitiBlocs and I cannot tell any difference in the quality of the pieces. Currently on Amazon you can buy 300 CitiBlocs for $57 or 200 Keva Planks for $69. Knowing that and having used both - I'd buy CitiBlocs every time.

My 4 yr old absolutely loves these CitiBlocs! He plays with them for hours, uses his imagination and builds really impressive structures. Even Mommy & Daddy are having fun with these, we all have competitions to see who can build the best. This toy has helped us to have more fun, family time together. Great price for a very educational and enjoyable toy. Please buy these and watch your little one have hours of entertainment. We will be buying more of these as gifts!

Let your imagination run wild with these blocks, although I wish that they would come with a larger book of ideas, but I was able to get more ideas online. This is a toy that everyone can get involved in. Would highly recommend. Even the 2 year old gets involved and inspired by the rest of us as we build our own. You can spend hours playing with these as a whole family. The kids of course love to build it just so they can knock it down.

I bought this for my 11 year old daughter and she loves it. She can play with her friends (or her dad) for hours. It is a fantastic, low tech way to have fun!