10 Legendary Star Trek Kit-Bashes

Kit-bashing designs together refers to the practice of taking bits and pieces of available models and, well, bashing them together to come up with something new. There are episodes of Star Trek that would simply not have been as effective without the production team emptying their toybox on the floor, sifting through, and asking themselves - what if...

The Battle of Wolf 359 is probably the best example of a variety of kit-bashes, though two ships from the armada - the Freedom-class and the Niagara-class - aren't on this list, as they both underwent a slightly different genesis before making it to screen.

There are examples in Star Trek of kit-bashing extending beyond the physical realm to the digital one as well, with Star Trek: Enterprise picking up on the practice of emptying a CGI toybox out too.

Which of these new designs are your favourites?

The USS Melbourne was the latest ship that was offered to Commander Riker, who was still mulling over his decision by the time the Borg arrived in The Best Of Both Worlds. There is a sobering moment when the Enterprise-D arrives at the wreckage of Wolf 359 as Riker recognises the broken hull of the Proto-Nebula-class.

There were two physical models of the Melbourne that were built, as one was intended for destruction. The other ended up appearing as a desktop model in episodes like Future Imperfect, Emissary, and 'Til Death Do Us Part.

It is also the only kitbash model that was seen in both the Best Of Both Worlds Part 2 and Emissary, as it can be seen from the rear window of Sisko's escape pod, right before the Saratoga explodes.

Emissary also introduced an Excelsior-class Melbourne so that a close-up shot of a ship's destruction could utilise a more detailed model. Mike Okuda explained this away by stating the Nebula-class Melbourne was under construction, with the intention of replacing the Excelsior-class, though both were lost in the battle.