How to build an 8-foot-tall light bulb out of LEGO bricks

While Saturday mornings typically find me sleeping in or going for a run, the morning of August 1st was different. I arrived at the museum at 5:45 a.m. to greet LEGO Master Builder Steve Gerling and the rest of his team. Dressed in jeans and fortified with coffee, we quickly got to work unloading Steve’s truck filled with supplies to build the world’s largest light bulb made out of LEGO bricks.

To kick off National Inventors’ Month, which is celebrated each August, the Lemelson Center collaborated with LEGO Systems, Inc. to build the supersized light bulb, the universal symbol of a big idea. We had planned the “build” to span two days, and while I had every confidence Master Builder Steve would make it all happen, I was a little intimidated by the many boxes of bricks that we unloaded that morning. How would all of this stuff morph into one giant light bulb by Sunday afternoon?

In all, about 40 boxes—each holding some 7,500 bricks of a single color—came off the truck and into the museum, along with steel supports (to stabilize the structure) and one giant tarp. The tarp was spread out on the museum’s first floor and, one by one, the boxes were emptied out. The sound of brick-against-brick in the empty museum was cacophonous, and as someone who has fond memories of playing with LEGO toys as a kid, the sight was magical! 300,000 LEGO bricks in all colors of the rainbow were mixed together on the tarp and then parceled out into buckets for visitors to use in creating their own small pieces of the giant bulb.

When the museum opened at 10 a.m., Steve began building the light bulb’s gray base and at 11, visitors were invited to begin creating their own blocks to add to the structure. “I loved how everyone could get to work on the big light bulb,” one visitor commented. At around 3:30 Sunday, Steve put the last visitor-built block—patterned to look like the American flag—into place. Upon completion, the light bulb was 8 feet high, 6 feet wide, and weighed approximately 400 pounds.

At 7:15 Sunday evening, we began to disassemble the light bulb, first removing the cap of bricks at the top and then pulling the light bulb apart in large “chunks.” The chunks were then broken into smaller blocks which we packed into boxes for their trip back to LEGO. What took us two days to build took us about 45 minutes to take down.

Like many great inventions, the light bulb was a true collaborative effort, the product of more than 10,000 museum visitors—and one Master Builder.

Editor’s note: Check out more photos from the event and this cool time-lapse video of the light bulb being built! Or download instructions to build your own LEGO lightbulb at home (.pdf).

Tricia Edwards is an Education Specialist for the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the National Museum of American History.

Comments

[Jason]

It's so cool to see kids doing this type of stuff that really stimulates their creative and problem solving abilities instead of sitting in front of video games all day! Lego's rock!

[Stan]

It's great how this turned out to be a community project but to lay 300,000 LEGO bricks over 2 days is still quite an impressive feat.

Given that the Lemelson Center is inside the Smithsonian, the light bulb is a very good choice of project given the Washington/Benjamin Franklin connection. If this project is repeated, I'd like to see something that represents America's later achievements such as the space travel.

[steven]

That's so cool! Lego's are indeed very versatile. At the showroom of this Truck Accessories place they had built a truck display out of legos it was really cool. I wish i had taken a picture of it. :\

[Joseph]

That is so cool that anyone could make a part and they where all different disigns!! Good Job!

[Kevon Jay]

This is indeed a great article. Things like this I find really interesting and fascinating.

I dont know if people realise just how versatile lego is? Its been around for a very long time and has stood the test of time. Its still liked by kids and i recall playing it when I was young although I do admit I wasnt very good at it :(

It started out as wooden but was then changed to its current plastic composition in around 1956. Since then the LEGO made today still fits the lego that was made in 1956 - thats amazing!!!!

Also for every 1 million bricks produced by LEGO only about 18 are ever discarded.

I do admit that I'm a bit of a LEGO enthusiast

[Cliff]

That is pretty cool. I have always been a huge lego fan it is fun to see that being built! Thanks for a good article.