A REPLICA of Darwen’s most famous landmark has been built by a man in the USA... out of Lego.

Andy Price, 50, has never visited Darwen but was inspired to begin building the India Mill chimney after seeing a video on YouTube of steeplejack Fred Dibnah climbing it.

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The model, made up of more than 8,000 bricks from across the world, has already been shown off at three Lego fan conventions in the USA and will be making a final appearance at another in January.

Liverpudlian Mr Price, who now lives in Granby in Massachusetts, said building the chimney was his greatest Lego challenge to date.

He said: “I came across the Fred Dibnah video on YouTube when I was looking for some inspiration and I thought it would be a great test and really interesting.

“I would love to visit Darwen now and take a picture of the chimney with my replica.

“I have always loved building with Lego ever since I was a kid and I like seeing how accurate I can make my models against real-life buildings.

“I have now made the tallest model in our Lego club over here.

“It’s definitely been the biggest challenge I’ve faced with Lego.”

Mr Price is part of the New England Lego Users Group, a small group of six to 10 enthusiasts who all make models to display at shows.

The IT developer surpassed what was the tallest model in the group at 5ft tall when his India Mill replica hit 5ft 6.5ins.

The original chimney, built in 1867, stands at 303ft tall and is now a Grade II listed building.

It took him around a month to complete and some of the bricks came from as far away as Slovakia.

Mr Price said: “The chimney lives in my home here and it always impresses people.

“It’s been nice to see all the lovely comments from Darwen people have sent to me on social media.

“It was a lot of bricks and took a lot of time, but it was worth it.”

Dave Owen, creator of history website Darwen Days, said: “For someone who has never even seen the chimney in the flesh this is just incredible.

“It’s wonderful that a landmark from a town as small as Darwen is now known about in the USA.”

“I think it’s an amazing piece of work that must’ve taken a lot of patience.”