Learn Online with WoodenBoat School's Mastering Skills Program

One question we get regularly is when our next building class will be. With the global pandemic a daily concern, and Ted focused on sprint canoe building for now, the answer is that we won’t be scheduling anything for the foreseeable future. But we do remember how fun and valuable those courses were, and that’s why we’d like to pass along a recommendation for the new online learning program, Mastering Skills with the WoodenBoat School.

WoodenBoat’s pedigree is so strong it hardly bears mentioning, but if you’re new to the field, WoodenBoat is responsible for the industry-leading magazine of the same name, the excellent sister publication Small Boats Magazine, a school, and several other offshoots. The Mastering Skills series will take the form of monthly streamable episodes hosted by boatbuilding experts like Greg Rössel, Milo Stanley, and Eric Dow.

Greg Rössel’s segments cover building fundamentals, such as how to read boat plans. We can personally attest to Greg’s talent and work ethic, having watched him get up at 5AM each morning to co-author Kayaks You Can Build: An Illustrated Guide to Plywood Construction with Ted, before leaving for a full day of boat-building for another project. As a contributing editor to WoodenBoat, he wrote this detailed and highly readable work about our electric fantail launch, Sparks.

Greg is also the author-illustrator of Building Small Boats and The Boat Builder’s Apprentice, a longtime instructor at WoodenBoat School, a consummate professional and a really nice guy. He’s in excellent company with his fellow instructors on the Mastering Skills series, making $49.95 for a year’s subscription hard to beat.

To be clear, Bear Mountain Boats isn’t affiliated with this project. We have, however, signed up to watch along with fellow boat builders and the boat-curious. Especially with COVID keeping us socially distant for at least another few months, it seems like time well spent. 

Click on the logo to visit the Mastering Skills with WoodenBoat School signup page