Training offers a new way
of life for Salcombe boatbuilder
Trainee of the year 2008 Robert Hitchen
A classic boat design from the past has lead to a new future for
BMF Award Winner Robert Hitchen. Robert now builds and repairs
Salcombe Yawls, one of the oldest racing keelboat classes. These
much loved open dayboats still thrive today and form the basis of a
start-up business for Rob who won first prize as BMF Trainee and
Apprentice of the Year.
Before training for a new career as a boatbuilder, Robert had
been a fisherman working crab and lobster pots out of Salcombe as
he explains. "I started working on my dad's boat at 19, then at 24
I bought my own boat and started working for myself." But this
wasn't the life he wanted and another ambition nagged away at him.
"I'm good with my hands and didn't find fishing very fulfilling
because I was just going out there and slogging away and not
creating anything."
There was another strong reason for making a change. Fishing
demands long hours at sea and Rob had a wife and two small children
and wanted to spend more time with them. So he made the decision to
train his way to new opportunities, although he admits that at 32
years of age he had to think 'long and hard' about it. "I'm
quite a mature student and I looked into doing a conventional
apprenticeship," says Rob. "But with a young family I couldn't
afford 3 or 4 years without a proper income."
The solution came with a 38 week City & Guilds course at the
Boat Building Academy at Lyme Regis and to pay for it Rob refitted
his fishing boat and sold it for a profit. He undertook to build
his first Salcombe Yawl as part of the course, but such a complex
first project for a beginner is not normally encouraged by the
Boatbuilding Academy. However Rob knew there were opportunities in
his home town of Salcombe for expertise working on this type of
craft because his father stores 30 of these boats. The college also
recognised that the Yawl build would not only benefit him but
others on the course too. "It was a real boost for me to go
through every stage of building one because then I could repair any
Yawl which comes into my workshop," says Rob.
Since completing the course he has built a small boatbuilding
workshop next to his house and plans to build a much more
substantial one on some land owned by his father-in-law. When the
larger workshop is complete he hopes in the future to be able to
take on another boatbuilder and he would also like to take on an
apprentice. "Training was fundamental in letting me do what I'm now
doing and the lifestyle change for the family has worked really
well," Rob concludes. "It was brilliant to get the BMF Award and
also really great because one of the college tutors won the Award
in 2004. We saw her photographs around the college and we all
looked up to her."