The world’s largest LEGOs-built Titanic replica is five feet tall and 24 feet long, but what’s extraordinary isn’t just the ship: it’s the young man who built it. The backstory behind this masterpiece is very compelling. This remarkable replica was built by a boy named Brynjar Karl Birgisson, a boy from Iceland who has autism. Brynjar was very young when he first became interested in the Titanic, the famous passenger ship that sunk in the early part of the 20th century. When the young boy was only 10 years old, he decided he was going to combine his Titanic obsession with someone else he loved doing: playing with LEGOs.
Brynjar, who is 15 years old now, decided when he was 10 to build the world’s largest Titanic replica with LEGOs. That’s a daunting task and it takes a very special kind of mind and determination to make it happen. His parents encouraged him to do the project and it took him only 11 months to complete it. That seems like a long time, but when you see the replica, you’ll imagine that it would take most people much longer than 11 months. However, Brynjar was extremely focused and he got it done in an unbelievable amount of time. During those 11 months, he spent more than 700 hours building his masterpiece.
Posted by Brynjar Karl Birgisson on Saturday, July 14, 2018
In the end, Brynjar ended up using more than 56,000 LEGO bricks to complete the project. When he was finally fini9shed, the young man had successfully built the world’s largest Titanic replica that’s been made with LEGOs. Even now, at age 15 and five years later, Brynjar still gets tons of recognition from people all over the world for his accomplishment and he’s often called “The Lego Boy,” which he absolutely doesn’t mind one bit.
Posted by Brynjar Karl Birgisson on Wednesday, March 25, 2020
The replica has toured the world, starting in Norway and going on to German, Sweden, and ending up in the U.S. at the Titanic Museum in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, where it will be through 2020. Brynjar has also hosted a Ted Talk to explain to an audience how a boy with autism could overcome so much to achieve a dream, and he’s even written a book about his experience, titled “My Autistic X Factor.” Watch the video below, and when you’re finished watching that, watch the trailer to his documentary.
The trailer to “How the Titanic Became My Lifeboat.”