Tag Archives: Boats

LEGO Icons 10335 The Endurance: worth enduring, or a polarising proposition? [Review]

Whenever we’ve had LEGO sets representing old sailing ships, they have more often than not been connected to pirates or their adversaries. In that respect, the newest entry in the Icons line is rather unique: a vessel designed purely for exploration. Polar exploration, that is! This is 10335 The Endurance, a model of the ship which took Ernest Shackleton and his crew to the Antarctic, only to get stuck and then crushed in the ice of the Weddell Sea. The Endurance has since become one of the great undiscovered shipwrecks until it was found in 2022, 100 years to the day after Shackleton’s death. Two years on, and you can now recreate this legendary ship from 3,011 LEGO pieces for US $269.99 | CAN $349.99 | UK £229.99. Availability starts from November 29, while it may also be available from third-party sellers like Amazon or eBay.

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

Set sail on the Endurance and read the rest of our review here!

Mind if I barge in?

New Hashima, the sprawling cyberpunk LEGO fan collaboration, is known for its towering buildings, but thanks to builders like Gerrit, the futuristic city is home to some impressive vehicles as well. The Aerox C-1 Heavy V8 Twin Engine ICS is a powerful flying tug that can move hover barges around New Hashima with ease. I love the blend of futuristic tech and mundane utility in models like this, but what I love most about Gerrit’s creation is the colors! Purples, azure, and bright yellow orange all contrast nicely with the dark grey utility. Those anime engines and the purple tower evoking a tug’s steam pipe give the vessel an eye-catching profile.

Aerox C-1 Heavy V8 Twin Engine ICS

LEGO Black Friday exclusive 10335 The Endurance celebrates Ernest Shackleton with 3,000-piece sailing ship and GWP [News]

Earlier this month, National Geographic released a documentary on Disney+ about the discovery of Ernest Shackleton’s lost ship, Endurance. With perfect timing, LEGO is now releasing the polar exploration vessel in a 3,011-piece display kit: 10335 The Endurance. Retailing for US $269.99 | CAN $349.99 | UK £229.99, this ship will set sail from November 29 — just in time for the holiday season. No mention of Endurance can pass without mentioning the incredible feat of human endurance that followed its wrecking; and so LEGO Insiders can also get their hands on an exclusive gift with purchase — 40729 Shackleton’s Lifeboat – free with copies of the Endurance purchased between November 29 and December 2.

Take a look at pictures of the Endurance and lifeboat James Caird below!

Life on a LEGO sailboat looks like paradise

Tales of life at sea have long cast a siren spell over many a landlubber and LEGO builder. Real-life heroes like Thor Heyerdahl, Ernest Shackleton, and Steve Zissou Jacques Cousteau captured the imaginations of past generations; with many followers on YouTube, Lauren Landers and her feline first mate Mak are new stars sharing the ups and downs of life on the waves. Builder Kevin Wanner was inspired by Landers’ home, the Soul de La Mar, and recreated it in LEGO. The sailboat is a 1993 Oceania 510, decked out for long-term life at sea.

Soul de La Mar

Kevin proves an able LEGO shipwright, creating impressive curves in dark blue. He first planned to build only the above-water section of the boat, but felt driven to complete the keel as well. The end results, with the full ship “floating” on a then patch of sea over a coral reef, is nothing short of stunning. The sea alone includes 1,900 1×1 tiles with clips to achieve the undulating effect. Kevin calls it a “don’t bump the table” build on account of the entire ship and sea resting on three fragile contact points. I hope he never learned that the hard way!

Soul de La Mar

Kevin’s gallery features many more angles of this exquisite ship. The build is an amazing tribute to the Soul de La Mar that just might have you dreaming of trading in your house or apartment for sailboat of your own.

LEGO Ideas 21350 Jaws: You’re gonna build a pretty big boat [Review]

DA-DUM, DA-DUM, DA-DUM…  no two notes are more iconic, or stressful, and the creature that those notes invoke is as classic as they come. Jaws, the original summer blockbuster movie, has an outsized share of iconic elements, scenes, and lines, and with the 50th anniversary of the book this year and the movie next year, it’s perhaps no surprise that we’re getting a LEGO rendition of one of those classic scenes. LEGO Ideas 21350 Jaws contains 1,497 pieces and 3 minifigures, and will be available August 6th for US $149.99 | CAN $199.99 | UK £129.99. LEGO Insiders will have early access starting August 3rd. Let’s dive in… ehhhh maybe we’ll stay on the beach for this one.

Read on for our full review!

Sailing the seven highways with Top Gear

For a show that was ostensibly about cars, it’s sometimes easy to forget just how much fooling around featured on British TV show Top Gear. Some of their challenges stick in the mind more than others, though, and LEGO builder Nard Verbong has re-visited possibly one of the most iconic in brick form. In 2006, Clarkson, Hammond and May were tasked with turning everyday cars into sea-worthy vessels. Predictably, the results were equal parts wacky, funny, ambitious and, frankly, pretty rubbish. But the designs were all very different, and the most successful (or least unsuccessful) was James May’s Triump Herald. The car model on its own here is superb, but the sailing accessories really make it.

Take a look at the other vessels after the jump!

A pop of colour set against a dreary WWII sea

Some months ago (well, over a year ago now), PelLego Bricks built a model of a Schnellboot S-100 – a German marine craft from the Second World War. Now, this was – and still is – a mighty impressive model, with some fantastic shaping. But they’ve gone one better and built an entire Norwegian harbour to go with it! The last time we featured this builder’s work, we commented on the excellent use of the humble LEGO tile. But while there it was on serene, flat water, PelLego has somehow manipulated the same parts into a darker, much more dynamic sea. The effect is terrific! Boat and water take centre stage, but the background has a nice contrast of colour thanks to some autumn foliage and the red wooden buildings, so typical of these Northern climes.

Break free of the chains that bind you – and turn them into a boat

Aido K‘s latest LEGO masterpiece has left me lost for words. Well, not completely speechless – but this is a family-friendly website, so I can’t publish my audible reaction. My favourite genre of creation – if you can call it that – is people using the engineered properties of the LEGO system of parts in unusual ways. That’s where the idea for this build came in: LEGO bricks are designed to work under compression – that is, being squashed together. Aido turned that on its head, so this uses elements in tension (i.e. being pulled). So that boat in the middle is almost entirely shaped by chains under tension and the pull of gravity. It’s beautiful!

Chain Boat

That means the boat can fold down flat for easy transport – which is just as well, as this model made its debut at the Brickvention show in Melbourne over the weekend. Seeing the boat rise from the chains is very satisfying!

This small LEGO fishing boat is simply Fabu-lous!

Building the gentle curve of a boat hull in LEGO bricks can be a challenge. That is, unless you find an old Fabuland boat part in your collection like Norton74. He promptly put it to good use as the start of a fishing boat full of the kind of details we have come to expect from Andrea. The simple dock gives a good setting without taking attention away from the vessel. It includes a small cargo hold and a rig for hauling in the day’s catch. Round, white studs give the boat a proper wake in a bed of transparent blue as it approaches the dock at the end of a long day.

Fab Boat

Elope with me, or in this case erow with me

Leave it to to Ralf Langer to draw inspirations from pirates and turn it into a surreal work of art using LEGO as the medium. We see two figures in a boat rowing across the sea. In the middle of the sea there is a square frame almost like a window in a wall.

The surreal "Sea"cret hideout

We can see two of the four sides of the frame and they show us two completely different worlds. One of them is a Tudor style building that we’ve come to know and love when it comes to Ralf Langer creations. The other one is a stone temple hidden in the midst of an enchanted forest. The two figures in the rowing boat represent inhabitants from these worlds. This is highly interpreted but my guess is they are lovers from two different worlds who are eloping. I might have over romanticised this a bit though.

These microwaves won’t reheat your leftovers

We’ve covered tiny boats by A Brick Dreamer before. But boats don’t get much smaller than this six-piece schooner. What’s most impressive, though, is that this minuscule mariner gets rocked by waves that actually work, thanks to some tricky Technic techniques. Good thing that lighthouse is there to warn it away from the microscale cliffs.

Microscale LEGO with Working Waves

Have a look at how the full model functions in the video below.

Smooth seas don’t make good builders

I’m sure we’d all like to have LEGO collections full of pristine bricks. The reality though is that they are not infallible, and sometimes we’ll come across a broken LEGO element and think it is good for no more than the trash. But as Josh (Sergeant Chipmunk) demonstrates with this underwater scene, broken bits of LEGO do still have a use! In this case, a selection of flex tubes that have seen better days are used to represent a broken mast in a sunken ship. The rest of the scene is equally is good – the shaping of the ship’s hull is great, and the rockwork poking through the bow makes it clear it has been beneath the waves for a long time. Those waves, incidentally, are made up of tiles and clips that allow for a wavy shape that, while fragile, gives a good impression of a sea in gentle motion.

Treacherous Shoals