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The Endurance

A tan-sailed model ship that turns Shackleton's survival story into 3,011 pieces.

4.5/5

Set 10335 · 2024

Pieces3,011

Minifigsn/a

Year2024

Set number10335

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The verdict

If your mate loves display models and history, this one's an easy yes.

It captures Shackleton's Antarctic ship with real elegance thanks to cloth sails, printed portholes and proper string rigging, and it lands well under Titanic money and shelf space. Just know going in that there are zero minifigs and the mirrored hull sections get a bit repetitive. For someone who wants a centerpiece ship rather than a playset, it's one of the best Icons releases in a while.

Best for: Adult builders who want a display ship with real polar history behind it

The full review

What it is

So your mate is eyeing The Endurance, and honestly, good taste. This LEGO® set recreates Sir Ernest Shackleton's three-masted ship from the 1914 to 1917 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, and it's one of those releases that landed as an instant hit. LEGO could barely keep it in stock when it dropped in November 2024. At 3,011 pieces it builds into a model roughly 80cm long and 47cm tall, with three towering masts, ten fabric sails, a red ensign flag, detachable lifeboats, a working ship's wheel that turns the rudder, and rigging done in actual string. The nicest surprise is the removable decking, which lifts away to show the living quarters and engine room inside, something most model ships never bother with. It reads far more like a classic wooden model ship than a typical brick build, and that's exactly why people fell for it.

The catch

Now the honest bits. The biggest gripe you'll hear everywhere is that it comes with no minifigures at all. Reviewers pointed out that even microscale sets like Hogwarts Castle throw in a few figures, and dropping in four expedition crew members would have told the survival story so much better. If your mate really wants the people, Shackleton and photographer Frank Hurley only show up in the separate 40729 Shackleton's Lifeboat set. The build itself, while satisfying, has a slow patch in the middle where you construct large mirrored sections of the hull, and doing the same thing twice can test your patience. There's also a small design quirk. The diagonal sails are held on by threading string through them, with nothing pinning the corners down, so they tend to rotate sideways rather than sitting where you want them. And at $269.99 it isn't cheap, though it's a bargain next to the Titanic in both price and shelf footprint.

Who it's for

Here's the take. If your mate wants a display piece with genuine history behind it, someone who'll happily spend three or four hours on an intricate build and end up with a centerpiece for the shelf, this is a brilliant buy. It sits at a lovely spot for grown-up builders who want something that feels like model shipbuilding without the glue and paint. Skip it if they're after a playset, want minifigs, or get bored by repetitive sections, or if a nearly meter-long shelf hog is a dealbreaker. But for the display-ship crowd, it earns its 4.5 out of 5 community rating and genuinely deserves the hype. Tell them to grab it.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

The build breaks down the way you'd hope for a ship this size. You start with a sturdy internal framework, then work up through the multi-level deck with its removable sections before moving out to the hull. That hull is where the pacing dips, because you build long mirrored port and starboard sections, and repeating that once you already know the technique can feel like a chore. Things pick right back up for the fun stuff: stepping the three masts, running the string rigging and ratlines, clipping on the detachable lifeboats, and fitting the ten cloth sails. It all comes in a single 420-page instruction book with 680 steps, so budget a solid three to four hours. It's pitched at experienced builders and rewards them.

On parts, there are no brand-new molds here, but the printed and cloth pieces are the standouts. You get over 40 printed elements, including a black 2x4 tile with the orange Endurance name and star, plus 32 gold round 1x1 tiles printed as portholes (with three spares, nice). The sails are the real headline: ten fabric sails across eight shapes and sizes in a neutral tan, with no logos or print, which is what sells the wooden-ship look. Recolor hunters get a boat anchor in pearl dark grey (previously only blue and black) and a rotor piece in pearl gold, plus a black version of the curved 6x5x3 panel. For 3,011 pieces at $269.99 the per-part value is fair rather than amazing, but you're really paying for the printed and cloth extras, and they're what make it shine on a shelf.

Fun facts

01The real Endurance sank in the Weddell Sea on 21 November 1915 after being crushed by pack ice, yet Shackleton brought every single one of his 27 men home alive.
02The set arrived hot on the heels of a real discovery: the actual wreck was found on 5 March 2022, sitting nearly 3,000 metres down with its name still legible on the stern.
03It's designed by Hans Burkhard Schlomer, and one Jay's Brick Blog reader even shipped the built model to McMurdo Station and photographed it on Antarctic ice.
04At 80cm long it's a far more shelf-friendly ship than the 135cm LEGO Titanic, at roughly a third of the piece count and price.