Lecture: Ways of Learning: An Apprentice Boatbuilder in Japan
Description
Ways of Learning: An Apprentice Boatbuilder in Japan
Date: Friday, April 18th, 2025
In-Person Event
$10/person | HRMM Members: $5/person
Program Topic:
Douglas Brooks is a boatbuilder who has been studying traditional Japanese boatbuilding for over twenty-five years. Since 1996 he has worked with nine boatbuilders from throughout Japan, and he is the sole apprentice for seven of his teachers. His teachers represent the last generation of craftspeople in Japan building wooden boats. Brooks’ research involves recording his teachers’ design secrets and techniques before they are lost. His latest book, Japanese Wooden Boatbuilding, is the first comprehensive study of the craft.
In this lecture Brooks will discuss the crucial role of the apprentice system nurturing Japanese crafts and the threat posed by the absence of a new generation of apprentices. He will describe the roles and responsibility of the apprentice faced with the unorthodox teaching styles of his masters, who in some cases is forced to steal his master’s secrets. He will describe his efforts to document and preserve this craft through articles, books and workshops, and he will discuss the future for this craft in a country at the forefront of modernization and change. His talk is a lesson in craft, learning, and boatbuilding, and includes his photographs of traditional boats from throughout Japan.
The weekend following the lecture, April 19-20, Brooks will teach a Make a Japanese Hand Plane class at the Wooden Boat School. Beginners and aspiring woodworkers are welcome!
Presenter:
Douglas Brooks is a boatbuilder, writer, and researcher specializing in the construction of traditional wooden boats for museums and private clients. His boats have been displayed at museums across the United States and Japan. Since 1990, he has been researching traditional Japanese boatbuilding, focusing on the techniques and design secrets of the craft.
Brooks is the sole non-Japanese listed in a 2003 Nippon Foundation survey of craftsmen capable of building traditional Japanese boats. In 2014, Brooks received the Rare Craft Fellowship Award for his work from the American Craft Council.
He is a 1982 graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, CT with a B.A. in Philosophy. While an undergraduate he attended the Williams College Mystic Seaport Program in American Maritime Studies. He is also a 2002 graduate of the Middlebury College Japanese Language School in Middlebury, Vermont. He lives with his wife Catherine in Vergennes, Vermont. To see pictures of his work and learn more about his research, please visit: www.douglasbrooksboatbuilding.com.
This program is being presented in-person at the Hudson River Maritime Museum's Wooden Boat School. The Wooden Boat School is located at 86 Rondout Landing, Kingston, NY 12401.
Members can receive their registration discount by logging in. Please note that you must be a current member the date of the event to receive your discount.