Boat Profile

8

December 2023

AdvancedFrame Sport Kayak

An inflatable kayak with fine paddling qualities

The inflatable AdvancedFrame Sport Kayak is designed for the paddler who doesn’t want to deal with cartopping but is still looking for good on-water performance.

6

December 2023

Lawton Tender by Newfound Woodworks

A classic tender for strip-plank construction

Newfound Woodworks’ 10’ cedar-strip tender is a reworking of the classic Charlie Lawton design of the early 1900s. The update retains the performance qualities of the original and is available as a kit for at-home builders without an extensive range of power tools.

6

November 2023

Georgian Bay

An affordable strip-built pleasure cruiser from B. Giesler and Sons

The Georgian Bay, an 18′ pleasure cruiser, is designed and built in Powassan, Ontario, by Giesler and Sons, a third-generation shop with over a century of experience building sturdy cedar-strip boats.

Small Boats Annual 2014

JADE

A gaff-headed sloop from New Zealand

To develop his trailerable daysailer, Herbert Krumm-Gartner started by carving a half model, inspired by the boatbuilding methods and design aesthetics of Nathanael Greene Herreshoff.

Small Boats Annual 2014

Pen-Hir

A modern classic pocket cruiser

François Vivier designed the handsome pocket cruiser Pen-Hir for his own use. He cruises the boat for up to two weeks at a time, often singlehanded, along the Brittany coast.

7

October 2023

Candlefish 16

A stitch-and-glue skiff with plenty of volume

Sam Devlin’s Candlefish 16, a stitch-and-glue open outboard skiff, is a good introduction to boatbuilding and an excellent boat in which to go camp-cruising with the family.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Mirror

An engaging English dinghy

With an open-cockpit layout, relatively high boom, and lots of seating, the Mirror is ideal for taking kids out.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Point Comfort 18

A modern deadrise skiff

Doug Hylan’s Point Comfort 18 offers the seaworthiness and lineage of a Chesapeake deadrise skiff with the light weight and ease of construction a plywood hull provides.

6

October 2023

The Laker Canoe

An all-purpose strip-planked canoe

Gil Gilpatrick designed the 16’ strip-planked Laker Canoe with good stability for relaxed family paddling.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Ipswich Bay Skiff

Built by eye and shaped by batten

The Pert Lowell Co. in Amesbury, Massachusetts, designed the Ipswich Bay Skiff for a customer who wanted a lightweight but rugged skiff that he could launch from the beach on a dolly.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Ultimate Freight Canoe

The wood-and-canvas Moosehead Laker

Abundant cargo-carrying capacity was uppermost in Francis “Mick” Fahey’s mind when he designed a wood-and-canvas freight canoe for his own use in the 1960s. The canoe’s versatility has made its successors, including this Jerry Stelmok–built Moosehead Laker named FIELD OF STREAMS, popular among camp owners and fishing guides in the Maine lakes.

6

September 2023

Summer Breeze

The most boat from the least materials

An award-winning 11′ 8″ flatiron skiff designed by David Beede makes the most of three sheets of plywood for the hull and a poly tarp for the sail.

10

November 2023

Centerboard Sloop #226A

A new traditional rig on a proven Gartside hull

Paul Gartside’s 16′ Centerboard Sloop was designed as a daysailer and cruiser for one or two. There are three options for sailing rigs, including a gaff main with topsail.

7

September 2023

Portage Pram

A towing tender for two adults and their gear

The Portage Pram is just 6′ 8″ long, weighs 35 lbs, is cartoppable, tows well, and can carry two adults and their gear.

Small Boats Annual 2014

Rescue Minor

From military rescue vessel to family electric launch

Shallow draft, center console, room for a family, and an electric motor make this Rescue Minor, built by students at the Great Lakes Boat Building School, an ideal boat for Michigan’s Les Cheneaux Islands.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Peterborough Nomad

A cottage runabout reborn

This 15' cedar-strip Peterborough Nomad by Woodwind Yachts was built on a mold created from an original Nomad launched by the Peterborough Canoe Company in 1958.

9

August 2023

Hiwassee Wanderer

A simple and affordable solo canoe

The Hiwassee Wanderer from Maddox Boat Works is a stitch-and-glue solo canoe designed for quick construction from three sheets of plywood without the need for building forms.

7

August 2023

Centerboard Lugger

Paul Gartside's Design #166

Paul Gartside’s Design #166, a two-masted lugger, is a satisfying and sometimes challenging project for home boatbuilders, and its shoal draft makes it a versatile sail-outboard-and-oar cruiser.

Small Boats Annual 2014

Sinne 610 Expedition Boat

For adventuresome rowing

For long-distance rowing trips on Finland’s many lakes, Jouko Koskinen had in mind a lightweight boat that would row very well but could also be fitted with bicycle wheels for portages and equipped for camp-cruising.

Small Boats Annual 2014

Thompson Thomboy

A speedy little runabout

The author’s THOMMY, a 1955 Thompson Thomboy, is in original condition, with nothing anachronistic or out of place.

Small Boats Annual 2014

Lit’l Petrel

A simple and admirable tender

The diminutive pram, less than 9’ long, has remarkable carrying capacity. A centerline seat allows the person rowing to choose from two stations, depending on the boat’s fore-and-aft trim.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Simmons Sea Skiff

A seaworthy outboard fishing boat

The Simmons Sea Skiff was first developed as a beach-launched, oar-powered fishing boat for coastal North Carolina, and it eventually evolved into an outboard-powered range of sizes, from 18’ to 22’. The 18-footer above was built by its owner, for family fishing excursions on and near Narragansett Bay.

Small Boats Annual 2014

DragonFlyer 3.2

Brooks Boats’ lively sailing dinghy

ZIP is the prototype model of the DragonFlyer 3.2, a design intended as a versatile and dynamic sail trainer. She can be sailed with main alone, main and jib, or main and asymmetrical spinnaker.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The New Hampshire Snekke

A Norwegian motor launch descended from Viking ships

Low-powered, double-ended launches called snekker are ubiquitous along the coast of Norway, but rather exotic in New Hampshire, where Andrew Wallace’s Traditional Boatworks builds these boats.

Small Boats Annual 2014

The Sid Skiff

A boat to take personally

The classic transom-sterned skiff that became known as the Sid Skiff, here with cobuilder Zach Simonson-Bond at the oars, first came to Ray Speck’s attention while he was living on a houseboat in Sausalito, California. The boat is as much as joy to look at as it is to row.