“A friend and, in a technical sense, an employee, but more truly as a partner.” That’s how Olin Stephens described his relationship with Aage Nielsen. As to their working relationship during Nielsen’s tenure as head of the Sparkman & Stephens Boston office, he had this to say: “Theoretically I was the chief designer, but I was well aware that Aage’s knowledge and experience were far greater than my own.”

As far as endorsements from your boss, on a scale of one to ringing, that one knocks the bell right off the top. And this is from a man who has himself been described as the most successful and influential yacht designer of the last century. Mr. Stephens wrote these words for all posterity in the forward to Maynard Bray and Tom Jackson’s book Worthy Of The Sea. The book is a fine effort filled with biographies of Nielsen and his boats and is an excellent introduction to his life and work.
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Ideally, custom boats are built to perfectly express and mold to the character of the person using them. In the case of GYRE, a restoration we began in the fall, we faced a different challenge: shaping an existing boat to meet a client’s needs. Our client bought a used, wooden cruising boat and asked us to transform her into a comfortable daysailer. To this end, the cabin house was cut back by a few feet. 

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Everyone knows that anti-fouling bottom paint is essential for the performance of a yacht. These paints contain heavy metals, biocides or photo-activated materials that discourage marine growth.

Bottom paint is always a hot topic among boat owners and boatyard workers alike. Recent environmental regulations concerning bottom paint have changed the way we do things at Rockport Marine. In 2010, we installed a catch basin to collect bottom wash water, which is filtered and then discharged into the town septic. This protects the delicate, intertidal zone in Rockport Harbor from the concentrated heavy metals found in the waste water discharged after a  boat bottom is washed in the fall. Although expensive to install, it is important that our coast line be protected by tighter regulations. Regulations such as these are  also driving paint companies to come up with more environmentally friendly formulas for their bottom paints.

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As winter marches on, the paint department works through the list of storage boats, giving them their annual maintenance coats of paint and varnish to prepare them for the sailing season. We talk to each owner and discuss what work they would like to do over the winter, and then each boat is moved into one of our two paint bays in turn, which are solely used for finish work. These bays are equipped with large exhaust fans, to change the air often, and are cleaned regularly, to keep dust down. The bays have radiant floor heat as well as baseboard heat, so the temperature can be controlled easily, and brought up or down rapidly, as needed for the finish work.
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Rockport Marine is the winter home to many offshore cruising and racing boats that have participated in the Bermuda Race or have crossed the Atlantic. Tom Kiley, service manager and rigging expert at Rockport Marine, has been a Bermuda Race inspector for 20 years. He can be found on the dock in the warmer months preparing our storage boats for the sailing season, offering advice and troubleshooting any rigging issues.  All our customers know him for his practical advice and he is an invaluable asset to anyone preparing for a race. 

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