Introduction: Laser Cut Lego Pins

About: Hi! We are a year long program based in the Great Lakes Science Center in Cleveland, Ohio. We develop curriculum for kindergartners to 8th graders, and teach camps for 6th through 9th grade. We teach every oth…

In this project, makers will create their own wearable pins in the shape of Lego bricks. This is a simple and short activity that anyone can do. We created it for a K-1 summer camp with a focus on Lego, and the kids loved them. They were very excited to pin them on their lunch boxes and book bags. Enjoy!

Step 1: What You'll Need

For this project, we cut all of our pieces for our campers using the file provided below. Only six small wood pieces are needed, a square top and bottom piece as well as four circular studs. In addition, a metal pin back is needed. White school glue works well for this project if used in moderation. Clamps can be used for all gluing in this project, but they are not needed. Any personal touch- paint, stickers and anything else you can think of- can be added however you'd like. This project, without drying time, only takes about ten minutes to complete.

Step 2: Assemble the Base

First of all, we glued the two square pieces together back-to-back. Each piece has its own engravings, four circles on the front piece and a line on the back piece. The squares must be glued together so that these markings face away from each other in order to properly glue the pieces in the next steps. Make sure to only use a small amount of glue so that the glue doesn't flow from the edges or take a long time to dry.

Step 3: Add the Studs

Next we glued on the four small circles in the engravings on the top of the assembly created in the previous step. Again, just a small drop will do great. These small pieces don't need much at all. They fit easily into their holes as well, which makes assembly easy and neat.

Step 4: Glue on the Pin Back and Enjoy

The last step is to glue on the metal pin back. The type of back we used fit nicely into its slot on the back of the Lego brick. Because of the metal, though, more glue might have to be used than before. Getting the metal piece to glue to the wood was the hardest part of our project when we did it with the campers. However, once it's on you're finished! Decorate your new pin however you'd like or leave it plain if you'd prefer. We suggest that you wait until the entire thing is dry before any decorating or wearing, though. We hope you enjoy this project as much as our campers did!