Titanic LEGO Ship at Titanic Museum in Tennessee

The world’s largest LEGO Titanic ship went on display at the Titanic Museum Attraction in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee on Monday. Brynjar Karl Birgisson, hailing from Iceland, built the 26 feet long, 4 feet wide, 5 feet high Titanic replica when he was 10-years-old with the help of his mother and grandfather.

In an interview with the museum, Brynjar, who is now 15, said that working on the Titanic LEGO model has helped him with his Autism. “Although I’m still autistic and will always be, I have trained myself to be ‘as normal as possible’ – whatever normal means. I was totally unable to communicate when I started the project and now I’m standing on stage and giving interviews. It has given me confidence.” Brynjar further shares that his “story has given parents of autistic kids hope.”

The Titanic LEGO ship was built using 56,000 LEGO bricks and about 120 tubes of crazy glue; the project took about 11 months or approximately 700 hours to complete. The cost for the building bricks and other supplies was funded with money raised through crowdfunding, books sales and sponsors. The LEGO group in Denmark subsidized the endeavor through discounts on purchases, and some of the LEGO bricks were donated. The teenager has spent the last five years following the replica around the world as it travels to different exhibitions, from Norway to Germany.