Britain's internationally recognised boatbuilding college turns out certified shipwrights on the edge of the Broads, where you build a real wooden hull by hand alongside a working cohort.
Britain's internationally recognised boatbuilding college turns out certified shipwrights on the edge of the Broads, where you build a real wooden hull by hand alongside a working cohort.
Living sceneVerified schoolsGold credentialHeritageWith the IBTC Lowestoft having closed in late 2024, the Boat Building Academy at Lyme Regis is the UK's leading full-time wooden boatbuilding school. Over 38–40 weeks students take complete beginners to professional standard, building real boats by hand across construction types from traditional and clinker wood to composites, working daily in the workshop on the Dorset coast. The course carries a City & Guilds Level 3 diploma; entry is by CV plus an in-person interview and the school has trained 650+ boatbuilders since 1997.
Nearly a year building real wooden boats by hand alongside a small group in a coastal boatbuilding school, to a recognized City & Guilds qualification.
IBTC Boatbuilding Diploma / completed traditional boatbuilding apprenticeship · Certifying body: City & Guilds boatbuilding qualifications (IBTC); apprenticeship lineage; UNESCO ICH for Nordic clinker traditions
I'm Arnaud. I cook for a living, and I've spent fifteen years on the water — so I know the difference between a real school and a good-looking website. I built the Atlas because I got tired of the second kind. Here is what a place has to clear before it goes on here, and what I'll tell you straight when it doesn't.
If a place dodges these, that's your answer. It costs you nothing to ask, and it tells you everything.
This is the short version. The full method is here — the six questions, in order, for any craft anywhere.