The History Of The Schooner Trinovante

The inspiration for Trinovante came one sparkling September day in Lisbon during 1983.

John Shores, Trinovante’s designer and skipper, was walking down the steep city streets towards the river Tejo. Unexpectedly the Portuguese Schooner Creoula came into view, riding to her moorings only a couple of hundred feet from the riverbank.

It was there and then that John decided he wanted a schooner.

Trinovante was inspired by Creoula that day but is not, in any sense a copy or a miniature version of her. The design brief was simply for a three-masted traditionally rigged schooner of less than 24m long with a maximum draught of 2.2m, and a cargo hold forward. She needed to be robust, seaworthy and easy to handle by a small crew but with the ability to carry lots of sail with a stronger crew. She also had to be economical to build and maintain.

John spent a year working on the design before the keel was laid in Wivenhoe in Essex, a small village on the banks of the River Colne with a long history of shipbuilding, fishing and sailing.