- Romantic representation of iconic British landmarks.
- Bright, bold colors in contrast to the puzzle’s dreary title.
- Moderate puzzle that you will want to take your time to solve.
Title: London Rain
Pieces: 750
Artist: Liliia Butenko
Size: 24in x 18in or 61cm x 46cm
Company: Buffalo Games
Year Printed: ?
A few years ago while on a business trip to London, I was fortunate to stay at a hotel near Westminster Abbey. Part of my routine for overcoming jet lag is to go for an early morning run. On one of those early morning runs, I found myself running next to Thames along the same route as shown in the puzzle’s illustration. The illustration seems to accurately reflect what I recalled seeing on that run with the Thames and Westminster Bridge on the left side and Big Ben straight ahead. Wanting to be sure, I pulled up that location on Google Streetview, and realized that the puzzle’s illustration was not an exact representation of the location but a romantic representation of it. For example, Big Ben is off to the right of the road and not straight on. There are no cobblestones, but large cement pavings. Almost all the iconic markings, such as the red telephone box, the fish lamp post, Westminster Bridge, and Westminster Abbey, are there, but not in the right location or have right perspective. Nevertheless, the illustration does a great job of giving the viewer a good romantic representation of being at that spot in London.
Build
The initial sorting strategy focused on the distinctive patterns of the puzzles. For example, the rainbow, yellow umbrella, red telephone box, red double-decker bus, and teal Westminster Bridge all have distinctive color and patterns. In addition, Westminster Abbey and Big Ben, the tree’s foliage, cobblestone walkway, and sky covered large areas of the puzzle that were distinctive enough to sort out. Unfortunately, we did not stick to the sorting strategy. Instead, we just meandered and solved the puzzle as we went.
Difficulty
The puzzle is probably moderately puzzle. However, due to our meandering enjoyment, it took us longer than expected for a 750 piece jigsaw puzzle. Overall, it took four puzzlers slightly more than three hours and forty five minutes (3:47:59) to complete. It is more than possible to have shaved up to an hour off the time if we sorting strategy was adhered to. Nevertheless, this puzzle was a joy to solve at a slower pace.
Lastly, London Rain is the 55th puzzle from our 87 puzzle collection. It is part of the Cities in Color collection. Leave us a comment if there are any other Cities in Color puzzles that you would want us to review. Be sure to check out the other puzzles of iconic world cities, such as London, Paris, and Venice.
