A new custom sailboat, ANNA.

[TomY]

Production sailboat building went the way of the Do do bird here in the NE, decades ago. Semi production sailboat building,...is not far behind.

The only bright spot has been custom builds in my area. Not that many but most are big expensive builds that I find interesting.

ANNA 65', was built at Lyman Morse in Thomaston Maine.

How much $$$? Who cares; millions of course, she's a new 65' custom boat. High maintenance? Yeah,...but the owners of new custom 65' sailboats don't maintain their boats anymore than they maintain their house in Tuscany, Jackson Hole,..etc, so that's not important either for us to critique the design.

In the design summary:

The mission of this modern classic sloop is to provide easy day-sailing to have fun with friends and family.

That is a common notion in the design of many of these current custom builds. The owners do not intend to cruise long distance or live aboard.

The roomy cockpit flows into the raised saloon that features large, drop windows in the aft bulkhead for easy socializing and communications between exterior and interior spaces.

Fair enough. The design is all about the cockpit and saloon and making them one and it looks like the owner got what he/she wanted.

Accommodations provide for 6, though overnights and cruising are not top priorities for the owners. However, purposeful crew accommodations for delivery up and down the eastern seaboard were specified. And the owners cabin forward has all the creature comforts commensurate with a yacht of this caliber.

Yup, has that...

While the owners’ racing agenda is light, this boat will no doubt perform well around the buoys or make efficient passagemaking the norm. The sloop-rigged yacht is fitted with a large main and self-tacking jib for easy everyday sailing. The yacht is made race ready by switching to the manually tacked 105% working jib along with downwind sails and cruising spinnaker to help round out the inventory in races or sailing on lighter days.

This is a Spirit of Tradition design. Racing SoT boats is pretty popular in NE.

It looks pretty fast, super easy to sail and it looks good to me(the house might be a little high,...). I hope to see it on the water.

https://www.lymanmorse.com/project/anna/

 

[shemandr]

I want dips on that forward berth - I bet the comfort of berths goes down from there. There is no sealing up there and I guess the construction is Plank on Frame. I kind of like the look. Others may like a more finished look. Overall a beautiful yacht. I don't like the table in the middle of the saloon. I would much rather the open space for entry and egress and maybe some kind of occasional table. And I'd rather the cockpit could be easily crossed. With several guests I think the traffic would be problematic. Also, I would like my guests to know they are sailing and not just passive cargo.

 

[TomY]

I want dips on that forward berth - I bet the comfort of berths goes down from there. There is no sealing up there and I guess the construction is Plank on Frame. I kind of like the look. Others may like a more finished look. Overall a beautiful yacht. I don't like the table in the middle of the saloon. I would much rather the open space for entry and egress and maybe some kind of occasional table. And I'd rather the cockpit could be easily crossed. With several guests I think the traffic would be problematic. Also, I would like my guests to know they are sailing and not just passive cargo.

Good points. The rendering shows the saloon table offset. But you make a good point. With a group, is it hard getting fore and aft, even at anchor - not to mention underway. Beside the owners stateroom, this is a pretty spare 65'er.

The whole boat is cold moulded and epoxy sheathed(all of these SoT boats have been). The ceiling on the inside of the hull are the inside face of the cold moulding pieces edge glued and sheathed.

 

[jon hansen]

i see the asail is on deck and ready to deploy

 

[shemandr]

Ceiling.

 

[Simon Sexton]

Someday.........

 

[Gunni]

The tradition of boat design and construction lives on in Maine, particularly great interior finish work.
I was struck when looking through the Stephens Waring website (designers of Anna) by this short video, Designing for Water. It captures for me the allure of boats; complexity, purpose-built tools built for a harsh medium.

 

[TomY]

The last boat I was on of a similar size was an Apogee 58. We climbed up a steep transom from a platform (I think) to a towering cockpit. The height felt surreal to me (I'm spoiled by a smaller, low freeboard boat).

Into the cabin was a long climb down a ladder. Once below, there were no views of our surroundings, only high fixed ports that allow some glimpses of tree tops in the beautiful anchorage. Overhead hatches supplied all the light which could have come from a Walmart parking lot. That boat was designed to cross oceans (which it rarely did, if ever).

Looking at the photos and drawings of ANNA, I think I understand the desires of the owner(s). I doubt they are young or if they are, they will be taking all ages out on this boat.

The saloon is a clever part of the design. With the opening windows aft and the large companionway, you feel it is part of the cockpit. It would give some protection from the elements for some guests(family, friends) while enjoying a day's sail.

But you've only descended 2 steps from the cockpit into the saloon. The benches are on the same level, so they feel part of the cockpit. You can see the clever foot rail mounted to the saloon benches to make up for the step (and foot rails mounted on the cockpit table).

From the saloon, it's only 3 more steps down into the main cabin.

Sort of explains the high-ish house. It must be such a puzzle to design a boat for someone. Much easier to design it for a group of buyers.

 

[Gunni]

The turned and carved interior woodwork is masterful, really warms my heart to see that craftsmen continue to live and work in the boatbuilding industry. I thought that was a dying art. The raised house is a bone to the current fancy to have open saloons with lots of view. All that would need to be boarded up if she went offshore and south. But I like that the cabin top stops well short of the mast, so even though the boom is relatively inaccessible, the halyards and boom furler mechanism should be accessible at the mast.

She’ll need a dedicated crew just to keep the bright work in ship-shape condition and the cabinetry oiled. Is that dark maple, walnut, or something more exotic?

 

[AlastairLC]

I remember Lyman Morse. My boss, 30-odd years ago, had a 43 footer built by them. He kept her at Old Saybrook till a hurricane put her on the rocks. (His wife wouldn’t let him sail her out.)
He had her rebuilt by LM. (The marine insurance division reported to him, so that helped.)
Having a summer cottage not far from Tomiston, I met him and his wife there to see how the rebuild was coming along. Real professional operation.
After his retirement, shortly thereafter, they set sail for the Mediterranean and eventually Tahiti.
As I recall, Clinton’s luxury tax hit US upscale boat builders hard, particularly in Maine. The well-to-so just bought from the European builders. Glad to hear that LM make it through and is still making beautiful boats.

 

[jon hansen]

gunni, the buying, selling, sanding, scraping, brushing, rolling, spraying, tipping, of varnish is a huge part of the maine economy

 

[dlochner]

As I recall, Clinton’s luxury tax hit US upscale boat builders hard, particularly in Maine. The well-to-so just bought from the European builders. Glad to hear that LM make it through and is still making beautiful boats.

Not to delve into politics, however, the luxury tax went into effect on September 30, 1990. Clinton was elected in November 1992. Here's a letter to the editor from the NY Times in January 1991 that describes the effect of the tax on boat builders. https://www.nytimes.com/1991/01/03/opinion/l-boat-luxury-tax-drives-an-industry-aground-926091.html

 

[TomY]

gunni, the buying, selling, sanding, scraping, brushing, rolling, spraying, tipping, of varnish is a huge part of the maine economy

It sure is and has been a part of the maratime history for a century or more.

Off the top of my head, I can think of at least 5 world class boat builders that could have delivered this high quality custom build, just in the Penobscot Bay area alone.

Competition is stiff to get these projects. The owners get a great value here in Maine.

 

[TomY]

The turned and carved interior woodwork is masterful, really warms my heart to see that craftsmen continue to live and work in the boatbuilding industry. I thought that was a dying art. The raised house is a bone to the current fancy to have open saloons with lots of view. All that would need to be boarded up if she went offshore and south. But I like that the cabin top stops well short of the mast, so even though the boom is relatively inaccessible, the halyards and boom furler mechanism should be accessible at the mast.

She’ll need a dedicated crew just to keep the bright work in ship-shape condition and the cabinetry oiled. Is that dark maple, walnut, or something more exotic?

I can't say on the wood, Gunni. Local boat builders are using so many different tropical hardwoods for various sustainable reasons, I can't keep them straight.

The old world craftsmanship lives on in these builds. But today those old world crafts are combined with amazing tech in these new boats. These systems (mostly wood composite) allow these one offs to be built.

If you didn't see it, this 2 min vid of the interior going in and the entire house/deck, is incredible. The efficiency gained in these new systems is obvious.

 

[jon hansen]

tom, do the builders use different materials like aluminum or steel or fiberglass. you have posted many wood sandwich builds.
after the early 90's PJ's switched out of building sailboats because the top racers no longer wanted aluminum.
German Frers cut his teeth at PJ's.

 

[jon hansen]

the last twenty years of the PJ builds the interiors were made of foam laminates with a very thin wood veneer. alas they are gone.

i don't think of hinckley being of much value, but then the rust belt has become a different world.
in 1961 Detroit was the #1 city in the world, now looks like Dresden after the war

 

[Scott T-Bird]

She looks like she is built primarily for fair-weather sailing in Maine. There is no shelter for the pilot and it doesn't appear that there is any consideration for protecting the helm area from sun or wind. Many of the large cruising sailboats seem to provide open air comfort, even for manning the helm. Sure, you can get away from heat or cold inside the raised saloon, but it seems that the saloon is designed exclusively for leisure. The large windows and indoor space would make anchoring in bad weather a pleasure, but sailing in bad weather would appear to be uncomfortable. But then, I'm sure there is no intention to actually be roughing out bad weather under sail.

 

[Scott T-Bird]

I think I'd go for a colored hull, such as black or dark blue.

 

[TomY]

tom, do the builders use different materials like aluminum or steel or fiberglass. you have posted many wood sandwich builds.
after the early 90's PJ's switched out of building sailboats because the top racers no longer wanted aluminum.
German Frers cut his teeth at PJ's.

Not much in steel or aluminum around here, Jon. A little fiberglass in a few smaller boats.

As these builders were mostly traditional wooden boat builders, building hulls plank on frame for decades and more, they have evolved their own high tech niche in cold moulded composite hull construction.

For one off custom yachts, you can't beat these composites as a strong, light, durable hull material. Plus it's hard to beat the beauty they can attain simply by finishing the cold moulding material, inside, like they did on ANNA.

 

[jon hansen]

love that genre they build up your way.
back in the 70's i took stone to the wert dock in in saganaw, mich a lot. up the saganaw river. next door was the gougeon brothers building facility. while others went to the gin mills up town to meet the ladies, i would hang out and watch what they would be building. very nice and friendly people. they would answer all my endless questions. watched 'slingshot' being built amongst others.