Recently, I have noticed a new trend in the Lego store. In addition to the plethora of ranges aimed predominantly at boys such as Lego City and Lego Star Wars (both very popular with my almost six year old son), I have spotted some new girlie ranges. For school age girls, there is the Lego Friends range and, for the pre-school girls, there is the Duplo Disney Princess range. My two and a half year old has been eyeing this up for some time - to be fair, we often end up with a lot of time to browse the Lego store, such is the strength of my son's obsession with the whole Lego Star Wars range, but she is consistently drawn towards the princess Duplo. As a result of her interest, we ended up purchasing the "Snow White's Cottage" set for her on a recent trip to Legoland. Snow White is her favourite of the Disney Princesses, purely by virtue of her receiving a Snow White dressing up outfit as a birthday present, which was the main reason behind our purchase.

* The Product *
This is one of the mid-sized sets in the Duplo Disney Princess range. It comes with 28 separate pieces of Duplo which include Snow White herself, a big white rabbit, a table and chairs with a plate of red apples on it, a couple of flowers, a pink fence and the blocks to build the frontage of a cottage, or a smaller cottage frontage and a tree, depending on personal preference. The blocks for the cottage include a window which can be opened and closed, but do not include a door. The Snow White figure comes with a detachable satin skirt - this makes her look more "princessey" but is slightly annoying as my daughter keeps losing it in the big box of Duplo and I have to spend ages searching for it. Apart from the skirt, everything else is exactly as you would expect from the Duplo range - brightly coloured plastic of a consistently high quality.

* Playability *
The first thing I want to say about this set in terms of playability is that my daughter absolutely loves it. She will take one of our existing Lego bases, build the cottage and set up the picnic table outside so that Snow White and the rabbit can have a picnic. It is very simple to construct an approximation of a cottage using the blocks provided and the results are very cute and ideally suited to its pre-school market. However, the second thing that I would add is that we have a lot of Duplo so my daughter can easily add to her construction, bring in more people or more animals and create a more complex game for herself. I would question the long-term appeal of this set in isolation - there are no other people to recreate the story with and the building options are very limited. We have since purchased the Sleeping Beauty set as well which is similar in content - although at least now Sleeping Beauty can join Snow White for a tea party! Ideally, I see this set as an add-on to an existing Duplo collection - if you are looking for a first Duplo set for a little girl it would probably be better to buy one of the boxes of bricks which provide much more opportunity for constructive play.

* Cost *
The RRP for this set is £13.00, although you might be able to find it cheaper. It is average value for money in my opinion - little girls will probably love it, but you don't get that much for your money.

* Final Thoughts *
I would recommend this set as an addition to an existing Duplo collection, but not necessarily as a standalone set for a child with no other Duplo. It is very cute, good quality, fun to play with in conjunction with other sets and instantly appealing to its target market which is why I am awarding it four stars. In my opinion, it is not worthy of a full five stars due to the limit on what you can actually do with it, but it is a lovely addition to our vast collection of Duplo. An added bonus in my daughter's eyes is that she never has to share it with the big brother who refuses to play with anything pink and girlie! I think we will probably purchase other sets in the range - I am already eyeing up Cinderella's castle (which, interestingly, is the only set in the range where you get a Prince as well as a Princess - but I would genuinely like there to be more figures or, at least, the option to purchase them. In the meantime, Snow White will just have to stick to the tea parties with Sleeping Beauty and the occasional night out with Bob the Builder!