‘A Lot of Blind People Have Been Left Out’: How This LEGO Superfan is Rewriting the Rules For Builders

The first time Matthew Shifrin realized he could build a LEGO set entirely on his own, he was 13 years old. Sitting at his kitchen table in Newton, Massachusetts, he ran his fingers over a thick three-ring binder, according to reporting from The Associated Press. 

The binder, prepared by his babysitter and family friend, held step-by-step braille instructions for a complex LEGO build, a sprawling Middle Eastern palace. The friend was aware of Shifrin’s blindness and knew how much he hated needing a sighted companion to translate LEGO’s image-only booklets.

As Shifrin created the palace, he felt the thrill of understanding every piece and every connection, without anyone else standing between him and the bricks. He had always loved LEGO, but his blindness meant he depended on family and friends to narrate the instructions. The palace binder changed the game. For the first time, he could build at his own pace and revisit steps. 

“This was the first time that I was able to build a LEGO set on my own,” Shifrin told AP. “It was truly an amazing experience because I was completely in control of the whole building process. I knew where the pieces went and I was able to learn about the world around me.”

Rewriting Lego’s rules

Shifrin decided that if one LEGO build could be translated into braille, hundreds more could, too. Three years ago, he formally launched Bricks for the Blind, a nonprofit devoted to creating accessible instructions for LEGO sets. Now, at age 28, he leads a team of about 30 sighted writers and blind testers who break down official visual manuals into detailed, text-based steps that work with braille displays and screen readers that convert the text into speech. 

The organization provides its instructions for free to blind and low-vision builders worldwide on its website. The guides describe shapes, stud counts and spatial orientations, so a builder relying solely on touch can visualize the model as clearly as someone staring at LEGO’s visual diagrams.

Bricks for the Blind has produced accessible instructions for more than 540 LEGO sets so far, according to the AP, from a 100-piece car to a 4,000-piece bridge. About 3,000 builders across the U.S. and internationally have used the guides. 

Advocating for inclusivity

In 2017, Shifrin took his case directly to the LEGO Group in Denmark, arguing that the joy of building should not depend on sight. His advocacy helped spur the company to develop official audio and braille building instructions, which began rolling out as a pilot program in 2019 and have since expanded to cover more sets.

LEGO also introduced Braille Bricks in 2019, which are special pieces with studs that correspond to letters, numbers and symbols. The bricks are available in several languages, including English, French and Spanish. The company has also gradually started including minifigures with vision impairments in its sets, weaving disability into its fictional worlds. 

“A lot of blind people have been left out of this cultural and kind of childhood phenomenon of being able to build Lego, play with LEGO,” blind builder Minh Ha told the AP. “There is something incredibly satisfying and also relaxing to be able to put together these very intricate, very beautiful and architecturally complex builds.”

Other toymakers have been expanding their product lines to be more inclusive. Mattel, for example, has given different body types to more of its Barbies and added to their lines Barbies that come with wheelchairs and prosthetic limbs.