LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower review

10307 Eiffel Tower is the latest supermassive LEGO set to come out of the LEGO Icons theme, elegantly designed and ludicrously sized.

In much the same spirit as 2020’s 10276 Colosseum and the growing number of increasingly large LEGO sets of recent months, 2022’s 10307 Eiffel Tower bursts on to the LEGO scene to offer up a detailed, involved and truly unrivalled LEGO experience of behemoth proportions.

10307 Eiffel Tower quite literally towers above all that has come before it as one of the LEGO Group’s most authentic, compelling and audacious LEGO sets of all time. A celebration of one of the world’s most famous icons of architecture, LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower also stands today as yet another marker for just what is possible with the LEGO brick.

How many of us will get to build it or ever find space for it in our homes remains a completely different matter. And how much a creation like 10307 Eiffel Tower is fairly categorised merely as a ‘set’ just as equally remains to be seen.

— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower set details —

Theme: LEGO Icons Set name: 10307 Eiffel Tower Release: November 25, 2022

Price: £554.99 / $629.99 / €629.99 Pieces: 10,001 Minifigures: 0

LEGO: Available November 25, 2022

— Where to buy LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower —

LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower launches in LEGO stores and at LEGO.com on November 25, and can be expected to appear at select retailers from that date onwards, perhaps in an exclusive capacity.

— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower build —

The first temptation with LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower is to try to compare it to something that has come before and to that end there are a couple of sets that come to mind. This begins with the previous, large-scale version of this same building – 10181 Eiffel Tower – that released in 2007 and, for LEGO design standards of the time and across 3,428 pieces, credibly captured the wrought-iron appearance of the tower and came in at a pretty impressive 108cm tall.

Then there’s any number of more recent sets from the LEGO Group that have similarly offered up such huge and challenging LEGO builds almost purely in competition to set one or more records – biggest, longest, first ever, most pieces, and so on. Along these lines and with consideration to the relatively singular colour of 10307 Eiffel Tower, we particularly think back a couple of years to 10276 Colosseum. Mightily impressive on display, but only after the most epic battle against repetitive building.

How fair are such comparisons? Beyond being based on the same thing, there’s little point in drawing parallels between 10181 Eiffel Tower and 10307 Eiffel Tower – 15 years and more than double the piece count are enough to explain why visually, stylistically and in quality there’s little similarity between the two. Putting 10307 Eiffel Tower up against 10276 Colosseum, though, is perhaps more applicable when it comes to the first half of any review of this brick-based Parisian build.

That is because, much like with 10276 Colosseum, 10307 Eiffel Tower is a mighty LEGO set in every way, which means it asks of you a mighty effort to build. This is in every way possible, from fine placement and attention to detail in every step and in the precise angles and positioning of numerous pieces, through to applying the right discipline and mindset to simply get through what is such an extensive construction process. 10307 Eiffel Tower is, quite clearly, a remarkable feat of LEGO engineering serving, in such a way, as a beautiful and unique tribute to its source material. But it’s also quite obviously a beast of a LEGO set that will ask of you a great deal of money, time, dedication and focus.

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We wrote about this experience with 10276 Colosseum, and with 10307 Eiffel Tower it’s rather similar, but where there were once a lot of tan bricks being built in a circle, there are now a lot of dark grey bricks being built up, and up, and up. And when we say a lot, we mean it, in a way that building such a set unfortunately and unavoidably becomes hugely repetitive.

Large sections of the Eiffel Tower that would ordinarily be (and have been) represented in a smaller LEGO set by singular bricks are instead, at these more epic proportions, able to be broken down and stretched across hundreds of pieces, then compartmentalised into repeated build actions and techniques that slowly come together to build up the tower and more finely capture a great many features and details that make up its unique iron framework.

This more particular approach allows for authenticity to be breathed into the model, in a way that is informative to how the real Eiffel Tower was built over that two-year period between 1887 and 1889, and truly celebratory of both its unique architecture and its iconic artistry – it’s a model to be wholly savoured in construction, step by step. This is perhaps best exemplified in the number of different, interesting geometric patterns that you’ll put together for different sections of the tower.

Yet at the same time, as we say, through its size and the number of repeated steps (x72 of this action, x144 of that, x4 of all of it again), it does mean that in various stages the LEGO build experience also becomes tedious – so much so that you may wonder if 10307 Eiffel Tower will also require two years to complete.

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It is obvious and needs saying all the same – building LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower will demand more of you as a LEGO fan than almost any set that has come before it, and you would be wise to pace yourself and draw out the experience in response. And of course, for such a set to require its own method of approach and consideration in construction, it’s rather inevitable that it will demand just as much thought for where to put it once complete…

Because yes, a half-metre square of floor and 1.5m clearance in height is quite the space for anything to demand, let alone what is ostensibly still at its core a LEGO set. It’s a good thing the holiday season is upon us, because this is equivalent in size to an average height Christmas tree – maybe you could put some lights on it and hope nobody notices. It’s hard enough as it is to convince loved ones that we don’t have too much LEGO, and that this hobby is under control, without having to now convince them that they don’t need that item of furniture in the living room anymore because you’ve got something better (yes, fragile and all dark grey, but way better), or that the dining room table would now look great with a centrepiece on it that leaves no space for the dinnerware and reaches all the way up to the ceiling.

10307 Eiffel Tower looks amazing, it is resplendent and serves wonderfully as the ultimate, one-of-a-kind LEGO experience that anyone spending hundreds of pounds, dollars or Euros on would hope for. It pays such loving tribute to one of modern world architecture’s most famous buildings and stands so impressively once built.

Yet, seemingly to accomplish all that in such a comprehensive way and to be that extraordinary, 10307 Eiffel Tower has also turned out quite supermassive. Supermassive in a way that dwarfs anything and everything around it – impressively at first, but then you begin to realise, also quite detrimentally. Being so bizarrely big in comparison to quite literally any other LEGO set you have (including those tiny UCS Star Wars sets) means that placing 10307 Eiffel Tower next to any other LEGO set creates this contrast in size and scale that only makes both sets look ridiculous. No other LEGO set stands anywhere close in height, in a way that absolutely diminishes them and also presents 10307 Eiffel Tower as just as clumsy in stature as it is impressive.

Not only does 10307 Eiffel Tower demand space and – quite rightly – attention, it demands it away from the rest of your LEGO collection, for the benefit of all. Such is its design and scale; it doesn’t sit well amongst other LEGO sets.

This is not a criticism, but rather an observation of just how epic 10307 Eiffel Tower is and how, as a result, this truly is an incomparable LEGO creation that perhaps is the first of its kind to challenge the very definition of what a LEGO set is.

— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower characters —

While LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower doesn’t come with a minifigure, its tie-in gift-with-purchase 40579 Eiffel’s Apartment does, offering up a neat representation of the engineer who designed the tower himself, Gustave Eiffel, and a vignette of the secret apartment he built at the top of the tower. This gift-with-purchase is available for the first four days of 10307 Eiffel Tower’s launch over the 2022 Black Friday weekend of November 25 to 28, or while stocks last, free with purchases of 10307.

— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower price —

Coming in at £554.99 / $629.99 / €629.99, LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower is one of the most expensive LEGO sets of all time. You wouldn’t expect anything less for what is at release the second-largest LEGO set ever produced. As to be expected, the LEGO Group goes all out at this price point, offering a build experience like few other sets and a final display piece that well and truly towers over anything else you’ll likely have ever seen, let alone constructed yourself. This is a LEGO set with build techniques within build techniques and detail that only a creation at this scale can showcase. This is an authentic and enjoyable LEGO model that will stand apart from anything else before it.

It also comes with further considerations and challenges that few other LEGO sets create in quite the same way. Where a LEGO Star Wars UCS set may need a large shelf or a display case to sit it on display, 10307 Eiffel Tower will need an entire section of a room and, as we have written above, ideally one away from the rest of your LEGO, if you want to really enjoy it. Super expensive, supermassive, one-of-a-kind – if you are considering purchasing this set then it delivers on all fronts, just be aware it’ll likely take up further expense and real estate as you consider where to put it. Maybe time for that extension after all.

— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower pictures —

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— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower pros and cons —

LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower stands as the tallest LEGO set ever created, with one of the largest piece counts of all time and is one of the most expensive so far released. These are facts that speak to the LEGO Group’s recent creative direction that pulls in the headlines, and people to the LEGO Store.

Importantly, though, these facts are not the focus of such a set’s design, but rather the result of the incredible, unbridled creativity that has gone into making it. 10307 Eiffel Tower delivers in every way you would expect such a set at such a price to do so, and then some more, because of this ridiculous scale that it comes in at.

10307 Eiffel Tower offers an incomparable, one-of-a-kind LEGO experience and final display piece that soars high above everything else that has come before it and has us questioning if this can even be fairly categorised as a LEGO set like all the others.

If you are lucky enough to build 10307 Eiffel Tower, then it’s there to be enjoyed and embraced in all its mad glory, just so long as you realise you’ll be in for a stark lesson on exactly what 1.5m of LEGO set really looks like.

LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower pros	LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower cons
Amazing display piece unrivalled in size, detail and authenticity	Sizeable investment at £554.99 / $629.99 / €629.99
Captures the beauty and presence of the real thing	Build process that needs pacing due to repetitive elements
Incomparable LEGO experience in every way	Much bigger than you perhaps realise
One for the record books	Doesn’t play well with other LEGO sets

This set was provided for review by the LEGO Group.

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— Alternatives to LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower —

Rather than alternatives, it’s worth considering two other sets that tie in perfectly in scale with 10307 Eiffel Tower – 21042 Statue of Liberty (which Gustave Eiffel also helped design) and 10294 Titanic. Both of these sit at the same 1:200 scale as the tower, if you have a room large enough for all three, and loved ones happy enough for it to be given over to what would be a permanent exhibition.

— LEGO Icons 10307 Eiffel Tower FAQs —