Model of Brooklyn -- From the same third party

If I provided detail photographs of, say, a four block section of Brooklyn, and was willing to pay for materials and for your time, would your group be interested in doing a Lego model of the area at a fair-to-middling scale? I would provide photographs from street-level and there is Google Earth (and Google Street View) for further detail.

My fundraising idea would be to put the model on display, and approach the local businesses to sponsor the model by buying signage on the model - in other words, if they want the sign for their business to appear on the model (along with just the building) they would have to buy the ad space. It could be worked out that the "signs" are done with labels rather than Lego to make it easier.

Let me know whether your club would be up for this - and thanks again.

Well, this depends: any option would be expensive, and none of us are accustomed to "pricing out" projects this way. Here are the factors:

1. Scale: There are two scales AFOLs typically work in: minifig and "micro," which is about 1/5 as large.

Over the past few years, LEGO has produced several official minifig-scale sets with high levels of urban detail. They retail for around $150 for 2,000 pieces. Many AFOLs now use them as the standard inspiration for their own creations.

Green Grocer
<http://shop.lego.com/ByTheme/Product.aspx?p=10185&cn=52&d=100>
Fire Brigade
<http://shop.lego.com/ByTheme/Product.aspx?p=10197&cn=245&d=100>

Conversely, the new "LEGO Architecture" line uses various micro-to-nano scales:
<http://shop.lego.com/ByTheme/Leaf.aspx?cn=627&d=70>

2. Parts selection: Some colors and shapes are rare and expensive, and these are inevitably the ones that best match whatever you're replicating. Designing workarounds can be tricky.

3. Design and pricing: The LEGO company now provides "LEGO Digital Designer" (LDD) and integrates it with "Design byMe" so you can order custom models. It can also output a parts list so you can buy elements on the secondary market ("BrickLink"), which is generally cheaper.

Assuming the four blocks are in a row (interior streets would be obscured), and each block has two buildings on the scale of the LEGO examples, and each has three stories, and pricing follows LEGO's model, that'd be around $1,600. PennLUG would have to include a profit margin, of course.

>[ads from local businesses as labels]

They'd have to be; brick-built lettering is tricky, has a minimum scale, and certain logos and logotypes are downright impossible.