An innovative artisanal ship docks at the Arctic Circle Conference

It has the most unusual shape. Looking at it from the outside, the Tara Foundation’s new polar research vessel looks more like a radar station than a boat — a smooth, round hull designed not to cut through ice, but to be lifted by it. The ship is currently docked outside the Harpa concert hall, where the Arctic Circle conference is underway, drawing curious onlookers to the quay.

“The first one who had this idea was Nansen,” says Captain Yohann Mucherie, referring to the Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen and his legendary ship Fram. “His boat was kind of round also, so that when the ice pushes on the hull, it lifts it instead of smashing it. That’s the whole point of this shape.”

The captain walked us through the ship, with the tour beginning in the mess hall, which has panorama views and smells faintly of a French kitchen—butter, herbs and something baking quite nicely. “For now it’s just the crew,” Mucherie laughs, “but when the scientists arrive, this will be full of life.”

From there, he leads the way to the bridge, where a surprisingly small steering wheel sits amid sleek navigation screens.

“They’re all like this now,” he says. “You don’t have the big one anymore.”

The controls are minimal, designed for precision, though the vessel itself will infrequently be steered in the traditional sense. Once it drifts into the Arctic ice, it will move wherever the currents take it.

Below deck, the captain points out the sauna, gleaming with new wood. “Every Arctic base has one,” he says. “It’s important for health and for the mind.” Across the corridor sits the medical room, a small but fully equipped clinic.

“During the expedition, a real doctor will be on board,” Mucherie explains. “In the Arctic, there is no helicopter coming if something happens.”

Then comes the ship’s piece de resistance—the moon pool, the feature that defines its mission. In the middle of the vessel, a circular shaft opens straight through the hull to the sea below.

“It’s a hole in the middle of the ship,” the captain explains. “We can launch our scientific equipment directly from inside, even when we’re surrounded by ice and it’s minus forty outside.”

From there, we pass the cabins, warm and wood-paneled. There are twelve in all, six double cabins, so everyone has their own space during winter. The full crew during those long, dark months will number twelve: a captain, chief mate, chief engineer, cook, doctor, media officer and six scientists. In summer, the ship carries up to eighteen people, including more scientists and, in a very French tradition, an artist-in-residence.

“Since the beginning, we’ve always worked with artists,” Mucherie says. “It’s another way to share what we do — science and the ocean, together.”

Down in the engine room, two powerful engines hum beneath the decks. Though the ship will spend much of its time frozen in ice, it is built to stay 500 days at sea without resupply, entirely self-sufficient. “It’s like a small village,” the captain says.

For now, this peculiar vessel, which was built in Normandy and took two years to finish being delivered only last April, is still in its testing phase. It will spend the next twelve months preparing for the cold, with trials in Finland this winter, where temperatures are expected to drop to minus 25°C.

“The boat was designed to resist minus 50,” Mucherie says. “We have to make sure everything works before we go north.”

Next fall, in September 2026, the ship will begin its first Arctic drift — a journey that could last more than a year, frozen into the sea ice and carried by it across the top of the world.

“It’s not a cruiser,” Mucherie admits, patting the steel bulkhead with affection. “But she is made for the ice. And that’s where she belongs.”