Minecraft in real life – buildings and finding inspiration

UPDATE: Architecture/city building Inspiration 2024 [200+ links] – PREMIUM MINECRAFT BLOG

This post offers some inspiration for city builders from real life buildings that look like Minecraft. These homes are chunky and simple, brutalist, modern, with sharp edges, clean lines and definitely no circles or curves! Some may have been built in the game already, while many others await their builder.

Building inspiration can come from anywhere – good photo sources include Google Images, Reddit communities or Telegram channels! One post, link or idea leads to so many others, it’s pretty amazing. Some basic tips for research:

Finding inspiration

• If you have an existing image you like. Use reverse image search on Google to find similar photos at different angles, and get names of unknown buildings.
• Without an image, any search will give millions of results! Try being vague or specific and search relevant keywords until good inspiration comes up. Try searching for things like;
• Locations, e.g. “apartment building in Sydney”
• Colors, shapes, sizes and other features, e.g. “wood and stone building”
• Time periods and architecture styles, e.g. “early modern skyscrapers”

Reddit communities

Example subreddits to explode for build inspiration include Architecture, Urban Hell, Evil Buildings, or the network of “Imaginary X” subreddits like Imaginary Architecture and Imaginary Cityscapes.

You can also search keywords into Google with “site:www.reddit.com” at the end of your search!

Telegram channels

Channels you can conveniently join on the Telegram app: Similarly to Reddit, just search up relevant keywords like “Design” or “Architecture”. Search for “Channel lists” to find even more chats to join.

Architecture styles

ABOVE: Here are a few major categories of architecture that never fail to provide blocky inspiration! Bare and monolithic tower blocks are easy to recreate in Minecraft. Minimalist buildings are even easier – just place down a single block and call it micro scale! Other than that, modern (international style) and brutalist architecture has taken over the world.

BELOW: Of course there are millions upon millions of examples of Minecraft-y buildings in real life. These are just some I liked and had saved. In the end, anything can be used as reference, even if it’s not blocky… or not even a building! But whatever your inspiration, best of luck on any projects!

Images: STOCK / PUBLIC