Windermere Jetty Museum was the first port of call for two day-long workshops on traditional wooden boat building.
Hosted by Gail McGarva, one session involved a local school Goodly Dale and the second saw adult visitors creating their own miniature ‘ghost ships’.
The Disappearing Lines workshops are a combination of practical hands-on activities interwoven with capturing the stories of craft in danger of extinction.
Visitors tried their hand at key processes in traditional wooden boat building – steam bending and copper-rivet fastening.
Through demonstrating and tutoring, they created their own miniature oak ribcage of a boat — a ghost ship symbolising the disappearing lines of the craft.
Gail said: “It’s important to keep this craft alive and the boats alive. They are both entwined with each other. Each working boat holds a nugget of maritime history. If we want to preserve this history we need to preserve the boats and the craft.
“Windermere Jetty has been a wonderful setting to kick off the tour surrounded by all these working boats as reference points.”
Gail McGarva by Rebecca Collis
The Disappearing Lines project is supported by Arts Council England.
Windermere Jetty Museum was the very first stop for the Disappearing Lines workshops which will tour 11 maritime museums across England this winter.
Next stop is The Dock Museum, Barrow-in-Furness (23 and 24 October) before Gail visits museums in Grimsby, Bristol, Great Yarmouth, Greenwich and Cornwall among other stops. More details here.
