Flotsam & Jetsam 11.09.26
Boatbuilders Directed by Luke Lorentzen
I haven’t seen this documentary yet but I’m very much looking forward to tracking it down
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At the head of a remote Maine harbor, the 60-some workers of the Brooklin Boat Yard coax wooden planks around a frame, make precise saw cuts, and sand edges for flawless joints, resulting in some of the most stunning and sought-after wooden vessels in the world. Over the course of four vibrant seasons, director Luke Lorentzen tracks the boatbuilders’ meticulous construction of a 56-foot sailboat while embedding us in the lives of these men and their close-knit community. Intertwining the rhythms of the boatyard and the natural world, Boatbuilders is a meditation on the pleasures that reward sustained attention and the potential to create meaning by engaging deeply with what we do and where we are.
Filming the Brooklin Boat Yard and its community for 16 months inspired a level of close observation much deeper than I previously knew I was capable of. I was in awe of the work being done by hand in the shop, the kindness that the crew had for one another, and the mesmerising changes in the natural world all around us. Being in this place inspired a distinctive, careful quality of looking that the film aims to now share with audiences.
I’ve aimed to craft a film that is both gripping and delightful, yet deeply patient in its attention to detail and appreciation for the wonder found in the routines of everyday life. And through the process of discovering this approach, I’ve come to believe with a striking clarity that we can find a deep care for ourselves, our neighbours, and the world around us if we slow down and look actively at what’s right in front of our eyes. Cinema is a particularly potent way to encourage people to do just that.
The J Class Revival: How Three Designers Saved The World’s Most Dangerous Sailboats
From Classic Boat Magazine….
The 1933 Velsheda was restored by Southampton Yacht Services in 1997. Credit: Carlo Borlenghi
How Andre Hoek, Gerard Dykstra, and Paul Spooner have led the J Class revival. Spirit of Tradition boats are a fast growing part of the yachting world, but the J Class revival has been something to behold. Andre Hoek, Gerard Dykstra, and Paul Spooner are Spirit of Tradition pioneers who have played leading roles in reviving the pinnacle of the classic yacht racing classes. Nigel Sharp delves into these great designers, and how this iconic and historic class has come back to life – with photos from Carlo Borlenghi, Onne van der Wal, and Michael Kurtz.
OENONE on the Market
Both Melbourne and Sydney Classic Yacht Sailors will be familiar with the sight of the little gaff Cutter OENONE plying the waters of Port Phillip or the Harbour. Well now you have a chance to be a custodian of this Linton Hope gem from 1901. Hope was a British sailor and yacht designer. At the age of 37 he won two gold medals in the 1900 Summer Olympics held in France, sailing his self-designed boat SCOTIA. In addition to his medals, his reward was to be appointed the naval architect to the King of the Belgians – and a commission to design a boat for Melbourne yachtsman Mr John Cumming. Mr Cumming unfortunately passed away before the boat’s completion; she was sold into Sydney, and the work was finished by Fords Yard in Berry’s Bay. New owners C H Reading and A R Marks named her OENONE. She was competitive on the Sydney Yacht Racing Association circuit, often winning handicap battles against the other great yachts of the time, including RAWHITI, BONA and WHITE WINGS. In fact, a classified advertisement from 1918 claimed she was “the fastest boat on Sydney Harbour”. OENONE seems to have gone missing from 1930 to 1958 when she reappears in the Lloyds Yacht Register – but this time built by an Olaf Soderberg in Melbourne. The best guess is that this was in fact a re-build of the older yacht. One constant is her bronze tiller stock, which has OENONE engraved onto it, and she looks very much like the boat built by Blunts in 1901.
Contact VICSAIL for more information
Hooking-up Tonga
Neither Wooden, boating or Sailing but a cool story anyway….Thanks to the Asian Development Bank
Nuku’alofa, Tonga – Robert Bolouri remembers trying to do business with the rest of the world from Tonga when the only option was an extremely expensive and slow satellite service.
“We used to joke that if you wanted to access the internet you would click on the site, go away and make a cup of tea, drink it, and then maybe when you returned to your computer the site would be up—if the system hadn’t timed out,” said Bolouri, chief executive officer of Tonga Cable.
For some patients of radiologist Ana Akauola at Vaiola Hospital in the capital city of Nuku’alofa, the lack of high-speed internet could be a matter of life and death. Unable to transmit large data files, Tonga’s sole radiologist had to mail x-rays and CT scans to colleagues in Australia for a second opinion. “The whole process could take up to 10 days,” she recalled. “Sometimes patients died during that time.”
Those days without a reliable connection to the outside world ended in August 2013. At the Operation Network Center of Tonga Cable, the King of Tonga, Tupou VI, initiated high-speed internet service with the click of a computer mouse. Alongside the King, then Prime Minister Lord Tu’ivakano declared, “Faster internet speed and higher bandwidth at cheaper and more affordable prices is a real opportunity for Tonga.”
High-speed broadband internet access has the potential to generate a host of new economic opportunities from e-commerce to online jobs. A 2009 World Bank study calculated that an increase in broadband penetration of just 10% boosts gross domestic product growth by 1.4% in low and middle-income countries like Tonga.
Tonga is one of the most isolated places on earth, a string of islands scattered over an area of the Pacific about the size of Myanmar. The first step to getting Tongans online involved laying an undersea fiber-optic cable by ship from Fiji at a cost of $25 million, a sum far beyond the reach of the small country’s budget.
Sparkman & Stephens Swan
A Legend
From Sparkman and Stephens Swan Association
Ten years after the publication of S&S Swan. A Legend, we are excited to announce that, on November 5th in Milan, we will present the Second Edition of our book.
Rather than producing a completely new volume, our intention was to preserve the original book exactly as it was and build upon it. The original text has therefore remained unchanged, apart from the correction of a few minor typographical errors.
Much has changed, however.
Most of the photographs have been replaced with period photographs by Bert Richner, one of the finest yachting photographers of his time, thanks to the invaluable collaboration of our friend James R. Taylor, curator of the Bert Richner Archive.
For the first time, readers will also find the complete original Plan Lists, handwritten and continuously updated over more than thirty years by Howard Pierce at the Sparkman & Stephens office. Published with the kind permission of Mystic Seaport Museum, custodian of the original Sparkman & Stephens archive, these remarkable documents allow owners and researchers to identify every original S&S drawing ever produced for the S&S Swans and, thanks to Olin J. Stephens' extraordinary foresight in preserving the archive for future generations, order copies directly from the Museum.
The Second Edition also introduces four entirely new chapters.
The first, The Special and Desirable Characteristics of Classic Swans as Offshore Yachts, is written by Juan E. Corradi and Alan Gilbert. Alan served as Chief Engineer at Sparkman & Stephens for twenty-seven years and is one of the last direct witnesses of the remarkable era during which the S&S Swans were conceived and built. Together, the authors explain what truly makes these yachts such extraordinary offshore sailing boats.
The second new chapter, written by Guido Cavalazzi, whom we consider one of the world's foremost designers of sails for classic yachts, explores the evolution of the sail plans of the S&S Swans.
The final two chapters, Materials and Craftsmanship and Proper Maintenance, summarize more than twenty-five years of research and discussions with former Nautor's Swan craftsmen, Owners, restorers, and Sparkman & Stephens experts. They examine the unique construction details of the S&S Swans and provide practical guidance for maintaining these S&S Swan in the way their designers intended, so they may continue to be enjoyed by future generations.
The new edition has grown from 288 to 404 pages and includes 203 reproduced drawings and original documents, 162 illustrated yachts, and an extraordinary amount of previously unpublished historical and technical material.
From The North Sea to Western Australia
Here’s an interesting one… The advertised price is $7000AUD, but in reality the owner should be paying you to take it away. Having said that its got the sort of charm that might just appeal to someone crazy enough to take on a project!
Morgen Ster means Morning Star in Dutch, and although details are scant it seems like she was designed and built by a Dutchman along North Sea Pilot boat lines. The life rings in the picture name Royal Perth Yacht Club so there must be some background out there somewhere.
Its hard to ignore the charm of the interior but there’s along way to go before you get to enjoy it. And also it needs to be in Tasmania not WA!
A little more information HERE