Top 10 boat designers of the world???

The selection of just one father/son team is enough to occupy 20% of the list, hell I can name 5 father/son teams that should be on the list. Interestingly enough, Nat Herreshoff nor any of his sons made your list Tad. I would think captain Nat would have to be on it, at least if not his boy L. Francis. Nor were; Rhodes, Stephens, White, Crowinshield, Burgess, Chapelle, Benford, Owens and about a 100 others I could come up with off the top of my head.

 

Ahh, are those guys powerboat designers? I think not, but I am no expert..

 

...it must be election year because people would rather argue about if its a good question and if we are all smart enough to discuss it, than just do it and have a nice discussion about design - the real reason we are all here...

 

Geeees, and I thought it would be obvious, Me, You (yes you the reader), and the bloke who designed the boat you love . . . . . In true feminine fasion this is subject to change without notice (upon beholding a more beautiful vessel on which to attract your money and attention - even those 3 fat ladies, )

 

??? These are your top 10 designers??? Wow...

 

& that includes your answer, You are included in that & so is your own boats designer (if you "love" your boat....)

Read carefully the meaning & interpretations...

 

How very strange Paul they are all American)
Met the current Hereshoff in Auckland a few years back, when the Americas cup was there, met him at the Around Alone party Nats Grandson, must have been in his late 60,s early 70, then
he spent 30 mins talking to me, , felt weird with all these people taking film of us, A true gent he was

 

Stuart, I can think of several Australian designers too . . .

 

Oh if you want Aussies, I like Robin Chamberlin, Bob Oram, John Hitch (X-IT), Schionnings, John Goss (Fastback series), Tony Grainger, Kanga Bartles, and many more worthy of greater credits...

 

You're right. But we have to consider that the US is the recreational boating world number one considering the sales numbers.

But still in my opinion the italians are doing the best design job, although their engineering skills are not the best.

What do you think? And what about a great passagemaker design? I still don't believe this guy up here in Turkey who believes in Bruce Roberts and William Atkins as the best designers of the world.
In his opinion the hull design is still one of the best ones. I simply don't believe that technology has not changed with in the last 70 years...

 

I Love Italian... not only the car, shoe and leather... food... GIRLS and temper... Equipment and Instrument... but their fast sleek boat... have one of the top design school iin boat anyway... chao...

Enough of Italiano promosi... Basta yes...

 

While I did consider Nat Herreshoff for my list, I'm just not sure where he might belong. Yes he designed a bunch of steam launches, but I think most of his contribution to the science of motoryachts was in lighter structures and lighter, more powerful engines. The Americans like to say he was the greatest yacht designer ever, that's open to debate, but he was so dam secretive that I don't have a great deal of info to work with. I have read several authors attributing to him the flattening out of sterns (creating the modern transom) for high speed launches. But there may be no way to confirm if he was actually the first to do this.

I would not put L Francis Herreshoff on the list of top ten powerboat designers for his dozen efforts. Some of them were nice boats, but its a small body of work.

Just as I would not add Jack Giles to the list for Woodpecker alone, though many would argue.

Don Blount has added a great deal to the science of small powerboat design, but point to a body of specific boats recognized as his designs?

"Rhodes, Stephens, White, Crowinshield, Burgess, Chapelle, Benford, Owens" For powerboat design? I just don't see it. According to Lindsey Lord George Owens (MIT proff.) would have his students (Lindsey) do the design work while he took credit and fees.

In my opinion John Atkin was a "better" yacht designer than his father William, and some will say that John should be on the list for Ninigret alone. But John was far less prolific and wrote far less, thus he was less "successful". Bull! William was pushed (economics) into forcing out designs that are mostly ho-hum, or in light of what we now know, just plain bad. Of course amidst hundreds of designs there are some few that are truly great boats, though not necessarily powerboats. But for some very good sailing boats, a huge body of work, and a great deal of influence on future designers, Billy Atkin deserves to be on any top ten list.

Bruce Roberts will not be on my top ten list.

 

what about john bennet

 

Oh and I forgot all the "designers on this august net!"