Douglas Brooks Boatbuilding

Douglas Brooks Boatbuilding specializes in the construction of traditional western and Asian small boats. Services include new construction, restoration, teaching, research, documentation, lines-taking, plans, and lofting for amateur boatbuilders. Douglas Brooks Boatbuilding’s clients include individuals, museums, tour companies, and Japanese gardens throughout the United States and Japan. Brooks has studied with American and Japanese boatbuilders; writes about traditional boatbuilding for Wooden Boat Magazine, KAZI (Japan), and Classic Boat (UK); has authored five books documenting Japanese boatbuilding (including the highly regarded Japanese Wooden Boatbuilding (Floating World Editions, 1995); and teaches workshops, zoom classes, and undergraduate multi-disciplinary boatbuilding courses for colleges including Middlebury and Bates colleges. Brooks has served as a demonstration boatbuilder for museums including the Peabody Essex Museum (Salem, MA), Lowell’s Boat Shop (Amesbury, MA), Niigata Prefectural Museum of History (Japan), Urayasu Folk History Museum (Japan), Takenaka Carpentry Tools Museum (Japan), Mizunoki Museum of Art (Japan), and at festivals including the Setouchi Festival (Japan) and the Port Townsend Wooden Boat Festival.