YACHTING HERITAGE CENTRE
MYNLE BOOK Bird, 64, from Gloucestershire, were among those watching as the champagne smashed on the stem of a replica Blue Mermaid, built and launched in Polruan, Cornwall. The new barge will be rigged this year and will begin operation under the auspices of the Sea-Change Sailing Trust as the first working Thames sailing barge to be built since 1930. She will be crewed by disadvantaged and socially excluded youngsters interested in learning traditional seamanship for a career afloat. Hilary Halajko, chair of the trustees of the Sea-Change Sailing Trust, said: “Percy Bird and George Lucas left us a legacy and we are hopefully going to learn their skills, to celebrate the memory of those two brave men.”
LEFT Mylne cufflinks and book to come RIGHT Robbe & Berking’s new Yachting Heritage Centre in Germany
MYNLE BOOK
One of the most enjoyable nautical books to be published in recent years is a collection of the drawings of Alfred Mylne. The book was published by Amberley and put together by Ian Nicolson, who worked with the great designer for many years. Ian’s pithy notes accompanying each reproduction of Mylne’s lines plans, each a veritable work of art, come highly recommended. If you enjoyed it, then 2018 is set to bring something else, as a group of Mylne scholars, among them Classic Boat’s yachting historian Clare McComb, have been busy putting together a lavish history of his work. Mylne was one of the great designers when yacht design was at its peak. His contemporaries were Fife, Nicholson, Stephens and other great names against whom he had to compete for work. Many of his designs are still afloat today and the book is bound to be a dead cert for any lover of yachting history and the quintessential era in yacht design. You can pre-order the book, by way of purchasing some rather smart Mylne cufflinks. mylne.com
J-CLASS ACTION
If you haven’t already, take a look top right on p65. It was taken last summer by top yachting photographer Ingrid Abery at one of the biggest ever gatherings of J-Class yachts in the class’ 80-year history. The J-Class fleet in full flight beneath Newport Harbour Bridge – hell of a sight. Created by the Universal Rule at the start of the last century, the J-Class’ big moment was during the 1930s, when these mammoth yachts competed for the America’s Cup. The greatest naval architecture brains in north America and Europe came up with 20 different J-Class designs. Ten were built (and a few other yachts converted to the class), before World War Two and a reality check on how much the big beasts cost caused their fall from grace. They languished in relative obscurity until the class – and the entire classic boat movement – was invigorated by one of the greatest restorations ever undertaken – Elizabeth Meyer’s rescue of the J-Class Endeavour in the 1980s. This astonishing project brought back to life one of the Js that competed for the America’s Cup in 1934. Other J-Class projects followed and today no less than ten Js exist, most of them new builds in the last 15 years. As per class rules, all of the yachts racing are original J-Class designs, but they are allowed to utilise the most advanced boat building and equipment technology available. The teams of pro sailors on board race as aggressively as if they were on a TP52 yacht. Many Js, for instance, now use North Sails’ 3Di RAW, billed as the lightest, highest performance sail on the market and hardly classic. The extraordinary rise and rise of the class came to a peak in 2017 with two events. First, in June we enjoyed the inclusion in the America’s Cup of a dedicated J-Class 66 | THE YACHTING YEAR 2018
regatta, the biggest ever gathering of Js, nine in all. Two months later the J fleet had moved up the coast to Newport, in many ways the class’ spiritual home, since the America’s Cup was raced from Newport for so many years. To see the Js racing en masse under Newport harbour bridge in 2017 was a moment in yachting history. And there’s no reason to suggest things won’t carry on in the same vein. 2018 will see more spectacular regattas, more great stories from the race course and it could well see the build of an addition to the fleet.
YACHTING HERITAGE CENTRE
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The rise of the J-Class continues and we may see more additions to the fleet
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Where do you go to research yachting history? There are places in the USA, notably MIT, and there are smaller archives dotted around, but now Europe has something major for itself. The new Yachting Heritage Centre in Flensburg has been built by family company Robbe & Berking, at whose helm sits Oliver Berking, a serious classic boat enthusiast. Mr Berking’s day job is running the family silversmiths, but luckily for us, he has meanwhile founded a classic yacht boatyard, he puts on the biggest dedicated Metre yacht regatta in the world and through a sustained input over decades, his corner of the Baltic, Flensburg, has become a byword for classic boating in all its guises – big boats, small boats, cruising yachts, racing yachts.
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