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Sold: FIFE ONE DESIGN DAY-SAILER, 1934, Professionally Restored – Lying: Isle of Wight

£22,000

SOLD

Boat Details

Overall Length: 24ft 6ins
Waterline: 16ft
Beam: 6ft 3ins
Draught: 3ft 3ins
Displacement: 3 Tons T M
Engine: None
Berths: none
Sail: Bermudian Sloop Rig sets 256 sq.ft
Designer: W & R B Fife
Builder: Dickies of Tarbert
Year Built: 1934
Location: Isle of Wight

LOTUS – HISTORY & DESCRIPTION:

In 1926 William Fife 111 was commissioned by the Royal Anglesey Yacht Club to produce a new one-design class suitable for racing in the Conway Estuary and Menai Straits. Fifteen boats were initially built by Dickies of Tarbert & Bangor at a cost, in 1933 of £275 with a £5 royalty to William Fife. Almost all of the original fleet survive with a later fleet of 22 GRP constructed Fife One Designs or Conway Fife One Designs, as they are often called. The class are still enthusiastically raced in their home waters.

LOTUS was built for James Kenneth of Oakfield, Lochgilphead, Argyll, also the owner of a 35ft ketch built by Dickies of Tarbert in 1922. After the war James, now Major Kenneth and his brother Captain M R Kenneth raced LOTUS locally in the Western Isles. In the late 1950s Dr. James Gutherie OBE of Bovey Coombe, Devon bought LOTUS moving her to a mooring at Torquay. The current owner’s father bought the boat in the 1980s sailing her out of Cowes. He was a founder of the Classic Boat Museum and used LOTUS to promote the museum. He had her restored professionally by Alastair Garland in 1995 before going on to race in regattas in France, England and Largs in 1998. LOTUS was kept on a summer mooring at Cowes and overwintered in the Museum boat shed at Newport. LOTUS has now been in storage now since 2009 and is something of a ‘barn find’ She is in remarkably good order and a very rare and affordable Fife. The design has all the looks and sailing merit of her larger sisters and offers a great opportunity to purchase one of the last true 1930s classics.

Close seamed mahogany hull, all copper fastened to steam bent oak timbers. Teak laid deck, varnished mahogany coamings, cockpit and covering boards. Lead ballast keel 1.5 tons.

Original spruce mast and boom. Set of Ratsey & Lapthorn sails.

Yard Trolley.

GUIDE: Sold – June 2019

LYING: Isle of Wight

VIEWING: through CLASSIC YACHT BROKERAGE – info@classicyachtbrokerage.co.uk