WoodenBoat Jan/Feb 2013: Paul Gartside

The January/February 2013 issue of WoodenBoat magazine has six pages about Paul Gartside, a prolific designer of boats. In recent years Water Craft magazine has featured a Gartside design in every issue. He is up to at least design number 185. His designs are under 50 foot in length with a "classical, traditional look and feel", and cover a wind range of types, though none appear to be "high performance" oriented.

Gartside grew up in a boatyard near Falmouth. He has worked as a boatbuilder and boat designer since receiving a diploma in Yacht and Boat Design from Southampton College of Technology in 1974. In 1980 Gartside emigrated to the west coast of Canada where he was strongly influenced by William Garden who had a long career designing a wide variety of boats. Several years ago Gartside moved to Nova Scotia.

Gartside was strongly influenced by Garden's design methodology which Gartside is quoted in the article describing as "for the most part he was using the very simplest of emperical methods, establishing a basis of comparison, taking known data from previous boats and plugging that in to predict where the next one would land." Gartside begins a design with sketching until there is a sketch which he and the client both like. Then he moves to the more detailed and analytical phase, whith the analysis heavily based on extrapolation from previous designs. It's interesting to me that all his drawings appear to be drawn manually rather than with CAD and a computer.

The title of the article is "Paul Gartside and the Design Spiral. Gartside uses "design spiral" to describe Garden's emperical method. Perhaps it would be more correct to describe Garden's method as one version of a "design spiral" since there are "design spirals" which have analysis at a considerably earlier stage of the design.

The WoodenBoat article is about the approach and general methodology which Gartside follows, not about the details of his method. It provides interesting insight into a small craft designer who appears to have attained reasonable success.

 

Gartside may have preferred the old fashioned way of producing drawings. Many of us still prefer splines and ducks and the feel and bend of the curve. In the eighties, suitable CAD programs were still scarce and expensive.

I can not imagine not using CAD programs these days. Doing the calculations by hand, for a sizeable boat, takes a lot of time and pencil lead while the computer can do it with blazing speed.

 

Paul Gartside is still designing and drawing by hand. No idea what calculations he does nor how he does them. He was born in 1953 so he is 58 or 59.

 

Not sure I follow this statement...what does it mean?.

Does it mean it is different from someone with significant success to that of reasonable success....and if so, why?

And what are you defining as reasonable success?

 

Don't read too much into my use of the adjective "reasonable". What I know about Paul Gartside is from this article, his website http://www.gartsideboats.com/ , his plans articles in Water Craft, and other mentions in magazines. He had been designing boats for over three decades and I've seen reports about a number of his designs having been built. The WoodenBoat article mentions that "With two children now in the mix, Gartside has found himself spending more time designing than building." So it appears to me that he's been "successful" at designing boats. Precisely how sucessful I don't know.

If you are interested in reading the article for yourself get a copy of the magazine, either in paper or download it from the WoodenBoat website. http://www.woodenboat.com/woodenboat-magazine

 

oooooh who has a attatude problem then !!

 

I dont mind how he designs his boats but the man has a fine eye for a good sheer!

 

Gartside is an example of artist , designer. His boats are very elegant .

I would love to see a Gartside Modern style design.

Is Gartside considered a Naval Architect or a designer ?

 

You're quibbling again. Why must you pick at loose threads, instead of enjoying the tapestry?

I hope the OP doesn't fall into the trap, and spend three days putting up with your demands to know what the definition of 'is' is....

I must admit, though: it's a relief to find you're that way with everyone, instead of just reserving it for me.

 

DCockey, tks for the post. Gartside sounds like the sort of designer I enjoy, and it's a reminder that there's really no excuse for me not to have a Woodenboat subscription. I have a very good collection of the earlier issues, but stopped buying it when I started working here about 12 years ago. Oddly enough, no one in this small desert town carries it.....

add: OK, done. I just subscribed to both the digital and print versions for one year; it cost me $42.00. Nice, with my schedule. Because now if I don't make it home to pick up the magazine in person, I can read it on my laptop.

 

The home page of his website has at the top:

Paul Gartside Ltd.
BOATBUILDER AND DESIGNER​

 

That’s because you read everything as personal and subjective, rather than objective.

Any engineer would read it for what it is….i.e. defining the limits of the debate and what the intention is to arrive at a conclusion of “something”. Without setting limits and defining the said limits, one ends up going around in circles and arguing emotively about the wrong issues. I find it interesting that those with a hidden agenda, dislike being questioned on their statements or paranoid, always see it as something else.

Funny….had this same tired conversation before…ergo…!!!

 

WoodenBoat seems to have "pet" or favorite designers, they like to publish and Paul Gartside is one of them. You'll find a handful of designers, continuously appearing in their "design" section or as a feature piece. WoodenBoat is mostly a "reader contribution" publication, so this could have something to do with it. If I see yet another small, light lapstrake daysailor, of traditional proportions and flavor from Iain Oughtred on their pages, I'll puke. Don't get me wrong, his work is well thought out and finely executed, but dozens of appearances, all of pretty much the same thing, maybe 6" longer or shorter then the previous one, pleease. Gartside has a good eye, but seems in a similar rut, being his structures aren't especially innovative, shapes are pretty standard and though he does have an eye, there are plenty of traditional craft to choose from, so another fantail launch, built in a traditional fashion with traditional shapes, well is a bit redundant.

 

One of your problems (just one...) is your assumption that people must have hidden agendas. Guess what? In the real world, sometimes there aren't any.

And yes, I do take it personally when you harass me with bs quibbling. There's nothing more personal than wasting my time and energy, unless it's getting into my wallet on top of it.

Why should I spend my limited time dealing with some nimrod who insists on knowing whether I think butter is good or evil? Much less someone who demands a detailed, ironclad definition of 'reasonable success'.....

I repeat: you're picking at threads, instead of enjoying the tapestry. Get a life.

 

And of course, you didn't even mention their East Coast/New England bias. I'll bet you could read Woodenboat for years, and not know that Edwin Monk ever existed.....

But that's OK. Like I do with people, I've learned to take magazines for what they are instead of what I'd like them to be.