LOCATED JUST off Highway 109 North at 41 Business Park Dr. in Lebanon, Tennessee — far from the towering skyscrapers of Lego headquarters — sits a colorful universe of imagination known as Music City Bricks.
But simply calling it a Lego store would be like calling a grand piano just a piece of wood and keys. Here, shelves brim with intricately built models, and bins overflow with every color and shape of brick imaginable.
This place means so much more than plastic bricks — for the family that runs it and the community that gathers under its roof. It’s a playground, a place to just be, a place to dream, and a bridge between generations.
There’s no sugarcoating it: The day-to-day operations of a small business are hard work, especially when it’s joined together by love, sweat, and faith. But for the children of Music City Bricks — Zeke and Annmarie Morency — growing up behind the checkout counter and between bins of minifigures, it has been a school of its own.
“They never really had a choice,” said Stosh Morency, the store’s co-founder and dad of the operation. “They were thrust into it like kids in any family business. Other kids have household chores. Ours run departments.”
Zeke founded the store’s minifigure department with an eye for detail and a natural leadership instinct. Then, in true entrepreneurial fashion, he trained his replacement and moved on. He now leads the built-models department, overseeing a galaxy of finished creations.
His sister, Annmarie, runs the parts department and the store’s internship program, mentoring peers and younger builders who may one day lead their own departments.
It’s easy to wonder if they’ll take over the store when they’re older. But the answer is refreshing in its honesty: “Probably not,” their parents said. “The problem with training your kids to be confident, self-sufficient, and to dream big is… they will have their own dreams and aspirations. And we’re okay with that.”
Because that’s the real magic of this place — it builds both people and Lego sets.
Music City Bricks has become a modern-day village square — a rare space in our disconnected world.
Kids come here after school to build. Parents linger and chat over the sounds of clicking bricks and imaginative storytelling. People who might feel like they’re on the outskirts — children, adults, new-to-town families — find belonging here. And that’s no accident.
“Our community has lost some of that with big box stores,” said Stosh. “You go in there and never see a single person you know. It’s created a lot of isolation in our society, and we wanted something that could break that down, bring our community together, and provide a common thing.”
“I grew up with five sisters and a single mom for a while. She showed me you can do anything — you just have to teach yourself how.”
Later, his adopted father modeled the importance of self-reliance.
“He taught me how to move a refrigerator by myself,” he laughed. “But more than that, he showed me that no one will work as hard for you as you will work for you.”
The family holds this lesson close: If you want something to exist in the world — a Lego community, a safe space, a dream — you might have to build it yourself, brick by brick.
Running a small, family-run business isn’t al- ways shiny and photogenic. Behind the colorful shelves and kids laughing over “Star Wars” builds, there have been nights when the future felt shaky.
“If these walls could talk,” Stosh said, “How we stuck together even when it is hard and when you feel like each month might be the last in the business, and then God provides, and your community rallies behind you. How we act when hard things define and expose [us reveals] our true character.”
He thought back to a saying from their mother: Suffering builds character.
“We’d always respond, ‘We have enough character, Mom.’”
Yet, that character and solidity keep the doors open and the lights on. That character has become the foundation of everything they’re building, and with it comes memories that last a lifetime.
Ask the family what they hope people remember years from now, and the answer isn’t profits or popularity. It’s joy.
“We hope they remember all the fun they had, the friends they made, and how they were treated while they were here,” said Stosh.
And for every child who finds a version of themselves here — whether sorting parts with Annmarie or getting a tour from Stosh — there’s a sense that they are part of something bigger.
They are part of a story, a family, and a place where creativity is currency and everyone belongs.
Music City Bricks is a place to breathe. It’s where kids who’ve been told to sit still their whole lives are told to build loud, dream big, and take up space. It’s where families connect across tables of scattered bricks, creating something — anything — together.
It’s where people who feel like they’re on an island discover they’re not alone, reminding them that joy still matters, imagination still heals, and no one has to build their life alone. GN
