The Boatshed is keen to develop boat building as a community activity for all ages to take part and enjoy, keeping alive traditional skills and our north-east culture and heritage.
An example of our success comes from the assistance provided by the Boatshed team to members of the Portsoy Coastal Rowing Club to build two St Ayles skiffs, Soy Quine and Soy Loon.

Soy Quine was built mainly by a group of local ladies who had no woodworking skills but were trained in basic woodworking skills by the Boatshed team. Soy Quine was completed and painted shocking pink in time for participation in the 2012 Scottish Traditional Boat Festival. The ladies were enthused by the thrill of rowing on the open seas in fiercely competitive rowing events and so decided to form a rowing club and name themselves the Portsoy Skiffettes.

The seconds Ayles skiff was built mainly by the husbands and partners of the Skiffettes, who benefitting from the lessons learned when building Soy Quine, meant they completed the building of Soy Loon in 6 weeks. The men, who gave themselves the moniker Portsoy Skiffers, wanted to maintain Portsoy’s reputation for bright colours and painted their boat garish lime zest!

Both skiff teams have gone on to achieve success, competing in various regattas and the St Ayles Skiff World Championships. To find out more about Portsoy Coastal Rowing, visit their website

If you have a community project in mind or would like to find out more about using the Boatshed, please contact us.