Choosing a pre-made neon sign is a convenient option, but it may not feel as unique since others might have the same design in their homes. You can have one custom-made, but that can often be quite expensive.
DIY is always a fun and creative way to craft something truly unique that reflects your personal style and vision. And you may be looking for a guide on how to make a neon sign DIY.
We are going to guide you on creating three different types of DIY neon signs. One of them will be the easiest, the other slightly harder, and the last one will be fairly advanced. Let’s get started.
The First DIY Neon Sign: Simple
For the simple DIY neon sign, here is what you need to have:
Items needed
- Acrylic sheet or corrugated plastic sheet (high-quality cardboard can also work)
- Glue gun + glue sticks
- Paper cutter/scoring knife
- LED neon light strip
- Pencil/marker
How to Create This Simple DIY Neon Sign
Here are the steps that you need to follow.
- First of all, take the acrylic sheet or corrugated plastic sheet (whichever you’ve chosen) and cut it into two equal pieces. The exact dimensions depend on your size requirements. If you are going for a normal, moderately-sized square sign, for example, you can cut two equal 25 x 25-inch pieces.
- For cardboard and corrugated plastic sheets, you can use a paper cutter. On the other hand, a scoring knife can be used for cutting the acrylic sheet. You can also use power tools for this purpose if you have any on hand. A jigsaw cutter or rotary cutter can serve this function well.
- Once the two pieces have been cut, go ahead and cut 4 more thin pieces, each 25 inches long but only 1 inch thick. These are the borders, or the “spacers,” that will later have to be pasted between the two sheets to make room in the middle.
- Take one of the sheets and draw your design on it, such as a sign, symbol, or text. Use a pencil for cardboard and a marker for acrylic/corrugated plastic. You can use our neon sign designing tool to illustrate your custom neon.
- Once the design has been drawn, cut the shapes out using the cutter.
- By now, you will have one plain sheet, one sheet with the design cut-out, and four joining pieces.
- Lay down the whole sheet and attach the small “spacer” bits to the edges using glue.
- After that, attach the LED neon strip on the inside of the border. Make a small hole in the back of the sheet to let out the cable for the strip.
- Then attach the cut-out piece on top.
This will give you a simple DIY neon sign with a cut-out design illuminated with an LED light strip placed inside. This sort of sign is good for temporary uses since it doesn’t focus a lot on design and looks, but instead on creating an illuminated message.
The Second DIY Neon Sign: Medium Effort
Moving on, let’s take a look at the second DIY neon sign.
This neon sign is similar to the one we just discussed, except that it utilizes half-inch plastic tubing to create a realistic “glass-blown” look.
Here is how you can make this DIY neon sign.
Items Needed
- Acrylic sheet (preferably black, but any other dark color also works)
- Half-inch plastic tubing/pipes (similar to a typical gas pipe—can be easily found in hardware stores)
- Laser cutter or scoring knife
- LED light strips
- Glue gun + glue sticks
How to Create This DIY Neon Sign
The main concept behind this DIY neon sign is that the plastic tubing is installed to protrude from the front so that it looks like glass-blown lettering. After that, when the LED light is turned on from behind, the tubing lights up and appears like a normal neon sign.
The original idea is quite ingenious, and we will use an image or two from there to help you during these steps.
- First of all, cut out the acrylic sheet according to your required dimensions. A good side to start with is 20 x 17 inches. Cut your acrylic sheet to this size.
- After that, mark the lettering that you want to form on the acrylic sheet. The original guide covered this step by using cardboard. The design of the letters was drawn on cardboard, and then later placed on top of the acrylic sheet.
- The cutouts have to be made in a specific way. Here is an image from the original guide to help you understand:
- Essentially, the cutouts have to be the same width as the tubing at the start and end. The distance in between has to be slightly thinner. This will allow the tubing to pass through the endpoints while staying on top of the middle area.
- Once the cutouts have been made, put the tubing through each of the lettering by passing it from the back and looping it back. This way, the tube will show up in front without its ends visible. Here is an image from the original guide that shows this step in action:
- After that, you simply need to install the LED light strip behind the acrylic sheet. You can do this by attaching it around the border, or as the original guide suggested, create a border behind each word so that they all light up brightly.
- This will complete the construction of the neon sign. You can then create backing for the sign the same way as mentioned in the previous section. After that all you need to do is to hang the neon sign in the desired space that perfectly complements your style.
The Third DIY Neon Sign: Advanced
Let’s move on to the last DIY neon sign idea.
Here are the items that you will need for this one:
Items Needed
- Steel wire (such as garden wire)
- Pliers
- Wire cutters
- Backing material (such as plywood or acrylic)
- Electroluminescent wire
- Glue gun
How to Create
It is important to note that this design uses EL wire instead of LED light strips. Due to that, the brightness is not as sharp. This DIY neon sign can be great for indoor spaces but not so much for outdoors.
Here are the exact steps that you have to follow:
- First of all, take your backing material (acrylic, plywood, or even MDF) and mark out the design that you want to create. If you’re making lettering, make sure that the letters are joined together. This design doesn’t accord for separate letters and spacing as did the previous one.
- Once the markings have been made, use your pliers to shape your steel/metal wire accordingly. Make the steel wire into the shape of the design and attach it to the backing surface using glue. Use the wire cutters for trimming off the excess parts.
- Then, take the EL wire, and start attaching it to the steel wire frame using the hot glue gun.
- Once the EL wire has been attached, make a small hole in the backing surface where it ends. This will allow you to sneak the wire back outwards where it can be connected to a power source. One the electric wire should be exited via the hole and not the actual EL wire, otherwise the illumination will be thrown off-balance.
This DIY neon design is simple, but it requires precision for both the steel wire and the EL wire to come along properly.
What are the Benefits of Making a DIY Neon Sign?
Now that we’ve covered a few different sets of steps on how to make a neon sign DIY, let’s talk about the benefits of doing the latter instead of buying a pre-made sign.
(Looking at all the different materials and steps that we’ve mentioned above, you may be a little double-minded about whether it’s worth it or not.)
Here are some of the benefits that you can enjoy when making a DIY neon sign.
- You can customize the sign however you want, down to the smallest details. The arrangement of the lights, the backing materials, cutout shapes, etc., can all be customized according to your specific requirements and preferences.
- Making a DIY neon sign can often be a lot more affordable. The individual products used for making a DIY neon sign aren’t very expensive and can save you money.
- A neon sign you’ve made yourself is easier to fix when the need arises. If you’ve put together the whole sign yourself, you can easily fix it if any problem arises. You will be able to tell where the problem is occurring, what part you have to replace/fix, etc., since you’ve created it from scratch.
Final Thoughts
And with that, let’s bring this post to a close.
If you’re wondering how to make a neon sign DIY, the truth is that there are a lot of different ways. In this post, we’ve looked at three of them with varying levels of difficulty.
Which method should you pick? Well, that is up to you.
If you’re making a sign for your own personal space, putting in the work for it can be worth it. You can go for the plastic tubing DIY method or the EL wire style. On the other hand, if the sign is being made for an event or any other temporary setting, you can go for the easier, low-effort method instead.