Advice from the Drawing Board.
Career advice, reading recommendations, and educational resources for aspiring yacht designers.
If you plan for a career in yacht design, an engineering degree (mechanical, structural, civil) with some subject selections in hydro or aero dynamics provides the base knowledge to do the job. Specialized naval architectural courses are available, but many only touch on yacht design, most being oriented towards ships and machinery. Practical drafting (computer and hand) is also essential.
We also recommend being involved in a sailboat building project. This type of hands-on experience is great for learning and understanding the art of yacht design from the boat builder’s perspective.
Competitive sailing is the proving ground for the competitive naval architect. Get a feel for what makes a boat fast. Good big boat sailors learned in, and most continue to sail in, dinghies.
You may wish to check the links below for some educational resources. I hope you find this information helpful and wish you success in the pursuit of your career goals.
Suggested Reading
Educational Resources
Undergraduate, graduate, vocational, and continuing education schools with naval architecture, marine engineering, or yacht design programs:
United States
Canada
New Zealand
Netherlands
United Kingdom
Farr Yacht Design does not endorse any of the educational programs listed above. We simply offer them as a list of schools known to have naval architecture programs.
Internships
Thank you for your interest in an internship with Farr Yacht Design. We do on occasion bring on interns for summer or winter work periods but our ability to do so is dependent on our work load and the type of projects we have on the books.
We like to be sure that they will get a diverse set of experiences and that we have sufficient resource to properly mentor them so that the value of the experience is maximized.
In general we are looking for junior or senior (3rd or 4th year) level university students with an engineering or design focus and sailing experience.
A note for international students and applicants:
At present, the US Immigration system makes it very difficult for us to bring on foreign citizens for even a limited internship window. Larger companies can utilize the J-1 visa system for internships like this but it can be expensive for the sponsor agency and many of the visa organizations make it difficult for smaller companies like ours to get a visa allotment. Until these restrictions are eased we are not able to offer internship placements for international students.
Thank you for your interest in Farr Yacht Design and I wish you the best of luck in your continuing studies.
Ready to explore what 50+ years of design looks like?