A Rose is a Rose or maybe not

The Eye of the Beholder

Every boat is beautiful to its owner, you won't find anyone who will admit that their boat is a dog but what is beautiful to one eye is not to another.

If you're designing for yourself this little problem isn't a problem but if you're designing for someone else then it can be.

PhilBolger designed some very square boats, I happen to think that they are beautiful because they meet the design purpose. Similarly JimMichalak designs squareish boats and I like the look of them too. Other people don't. So at the outset you need to find out what the client wants the boat for and what he or she thinks makes a good looking boat.

You can do this using cartoons or sketches which you can discuss with the client.

TadRoberts has a website that shows his designs and a Facebook page where he discusses various designs of his and others.

I recently entered a design contest which asked for a design for a houseboat without really setting out the parameters. What they did was ask for a design and your reasons for selecting that particular design and how you would use it.

Here is the profile that I submitted,

I like the sheer to be at its lowest about 2/3rds of the way from the bow. I think that that is very pretty even on a squareish boat.

The interior layout should also suit the client, in order to get the design started I imagined a young, somewhat penniless, couple with a small child who wanted a weekend getaway. The idea was to use the vessel as a cottage for two on a large wilderness lake and it shouldn't cost a lot to build nor be too difficult. They also wanted it to be trailerable so they could use it as a travel trailer much along the lines of Roy Schreyer's Dianes Rose.

The boat is essentially a trimaran with a large center hull for storage under the cabin and two smaller hulls for flotation with a tiny house on top. It's not meant to go fast but it is meant to be beachable. It's 24 feet by 8 foot 6 inches, which is the maximum trailerable width.

I like George Buehler's idea that a boat that's meant to be lived on should do drinks for 6, feed 4, and sleep two. So the two chairs and the sofa bed seat six for drinks, the dinette table plus one chair is room for four for lunch or dinner and the sofa bed sleeps two. Because of the small child I made the dinette table able to lower to make a small bed. There is ample play space on the foredeck and high bulwarks to keep the child on the boat and not in the water.

My wife says that if you're going to do dishes by hand then you should be able to look out the window and since part of the reason for having this boat was to take a gander at nature in the wild we have lots of windows where they count.

The toilet is a composting one to keep the non-potable tankage to grey water only and eliminate the need to do major pump outs.

Now you may think that this little square houseboat is downright ugly and you're entitled to think that but my imaginary couple don't because it meets their needs and budget.

Next time we'll look at Kuai Lei, my Chinese junk, and why I designed it the way I did.