As the coronavirus (COVD-19) continues to spread around the world, we wanted to provide an update on our business.  Because of a stay-at-home order issued by our state governor, our office is operating with minimal staff until the first week of May.  Businesses around our country have been ordered closed, so we are doing the best we can to keep stock in place, keep up with customer e-mails, and keep up with orders while working from home and having one person at a time in the office.

So, we are still open for business, and we are still ready to help with your lighting projects in any way we can.  It may take us a little longer than normal to ship your order, though, so we thank you for your patience and support.

Please stay safe, and hopefully you can enjoy this time to break into those LEGO sets you've had on the shelf for months!

2021 Update: Since this post was originally published, we have launched our online User Forum.  Many customers have shared their approaches for lighting their models-- you can check them out and contribute to the conversation by clicking here.

Here at Brickstuff, we often get questions along the lines of, "I just bought <x> LEGO set, and I'm wondering what lights I need to go with it.  Can you help?"

OF COURSE we can help-- we love connecting with our customers and hearing about all the awesome things they are creating!  So if you have a question about any of our products, don't hesitate to reach out and ask.

Since we often do get the same question, however, we thought it might be helpful to publish this blog post with some of the most common advice we provide.

When considering which lights you need for a given model, the most important factor to consider is: what overall effect are you hoping to achieve?  By this we don't mean lighting effect, but rather the approach you plan to take to the lighting process as a whole.  Here it is important to decide whether your goal is to add basic lighting (for example, adding general, broad light to one or more buildings), or whether you're aiming for something more detailed (for example, lighting each individual lamp in a house, headlight on a vehicle, or laser on a space ship).

If your goal is to add a large amount of general light to relatively large spaces (such as the interior of a building), your best bet is to use our Light Strips.  We offer these in packs of 2 and also in a 9-pack starter kit.  As a general rule of thumb, you'll need three Light Strips per floor of a Modular Building-sized structure (use fewer per floor if you have a smaller building, more if you have a larger building).  You can connect the Light Strips end to end, so you can expand your lighting installation or add more light at any time.  We have published an online guide that provides more ideas for using our Light Strips to light Modular Buildings (you can use these same techniques to light non-buildings as well).

If your goal is to create detail lighting (lighting individual lamps, engines, headlights, laser cannons, etc.), then our Pico Light Boards are the right solution.  As with the Light Strips, we offer these in packs of 2 and also in a starter kit.

So, to summarize: there is no one "right" way to light your creations.  Depending on the type of effect you are seeking, you will benefit from using either our Light Strips or our Pico Light Boards (or both, if you want to light both general areas and detailed spaces).  For models like Technic models, space ships, and the like, you will probably want to use the Pico Light Boards.

No matter your approach or what you're hoping to light up, the easiest way to get started is to use one of our starter kits-- these include everything you'll need to be up and running quickly, and since everything in the Brickstuff system is modular, you can easily expand or adjust your installation (or your approach) at any time.

We hope this information has been helpful.  If you have additional specific questions, we'd be happy to help!  Just send us a note via our Contact page and we'll be in touch.