Opening up the offshore world
Development of live-aboard cruisers
This was a sport or leisure activity. It became a lifestyle. In the 1950s, sailing attracted passionate enthusiasts looking for new sensations. Plywood dinghies, like the Vaurien and its competitor the Mousse, enabled the post-war generations to enjoy the freedom offered by the water. But “sailing” mainly involved crisscrossing a bay or racing in front of the beach. Some privileged sailors left the coasts behind on board their elegant and expensive yachts. And a few dozen daring people managed to imitate these fortunate sailors, thanks to the training programs on live-aboards at Les Glénans. They remained a very small minority.
But suddenly, at the end of the decade, and especially throughout the following decade, everything changed. Regular beachgoers and fans of water sports discovered another world: the exhilaration of embarking on offshore adventures, seeing the coasts transform into simple faraway lines and unknown islands take shape on the horizon. Even better, dinghy enthusiasts were amazed to discover the mysteries of the night at sea, enjoying the cozy havens of their berths and waking, slightly groggy, at impossible times for their introduction to the magic of nighttime watches.
The appearance of new units designed for the high seas, but accessible to the middle classes, made this transformation possible. Tabarly would never have been able to convert France to recreational boating without the emergence on the market of these sailing cruisers that combined good seafaring performance with – relatively – cheap prices. Four of them are still iconic today.
The corsaire, a revolution from les Glénans
The first unit from this new squadron takes shape, as expected of course, at the Les Glénans sailing school. Jean-Jacques Herbulot’s sorcery enabled the plywood sheets to be transformed into a marvelous little dinghy, christened the Vaurien. The famous school wanted to take a step forward and introduce its students to cruising on board cruisers that were simpler and less expensive than its Côtre des Glénans cutters.
True to his principles, Herbulot created a live-aboard plan whose planking used just two standard sheets of plywood. He achieved a sailboat with lines that are still surprisingly modern today and with a length that could not exceed 5.50 meters, for the reason that we have just mentioned. He called his creation the Corsaire, which means privateer in French, an apt name for a buccaneering cruiser designed to disrupt the world of boat building at the time.
Looking beyond Les Glénans, this was an immediate success. The 2CV of the swells opened up a sense of freedom on the high seas for thousands of new recreational boat users. With a truly innovative deck plan, a low roof running the entire – generous – width of the boat, two “coffin-style” berths positioned halfway below the cockpit, and the possibility to set up one or even two additional mattresses in the bow, the Corsaire could accommodate three to four young people looking for adventure or a couple with two young children. Admittedly, it did not have a chart table, or a galley, or even toilets. But at the time, comforts like this did not seem vital.
How many daring young people sailed around Brittany, or crossed the Channel and even the Bay of Biscay, with navigation equipment including just a sea chart, a navigation plotter, a set of calipers and a small navigational compass attached to a handle for recording sea marks?
A 500kg ballasted dinghy (including 150kg of ballast), featuring a reasonable sails plan, with the Corsaire needing just a breeze to haul off. It could be anchored close to the shoreline, thanks to its draft of just 50cm, with the centerboard raised. It reached its limits when tacking in strong breezes and struggled to sail against a force 6 wind. With a force 7, it had to wait out the storm. Nevertheless, it enabled generations of future leading sailors to learn essential skills for cruising and coastal racing. At the height of its development during the 1950s, the Corsaire fleet, built at eight different yards in France and even sold in the BHV department store, reached over 1,000 units in the 1960s.
The Golif: the plastic revolution
This was just the start of the unstoppable sailing cruiser trend. 1962 saw the launch of a unit that seemed almost twice as large as the Corsaire, but was in fact just one meter longer. This was one of the first true live-aboard boats built using the material that would revolutionize French recreational boating, polyester. With its immaculate white hull and deck, the Golif was a resounding success from the outset, going on to reach nearly a thousand units in just five years.
This 6.50m “plastic” unit was born out of an initiative led by the head of the famous Jouët yard, on the banks of the Seine in Sartrouville, not far from Paris. The son of the company’s developer, the successor of his father who attended the prestigious Polytechnique school and who himself graduated from Ecole Centrale, Jean-Pierre Jouët, in his 30s at the time, was dynamic, demanding and daring. Despite the success of the company’s molded timber productions, like the Cap Horn, he believed in the future of fiberglass polyester laminate.
At the end of the 1950s, he linked up with a Dieppe-based company specialized in this new material. Driven by a group of skilled and passionate sailors—foremost among them Alain Maupas, an exceptional engineer and sailor, his brother Didier, who was already part of the Jouët shipyard team, and several Corsair enthusiasts from the Groupe des Croiseurs Légers (GCL), all of whom contributed to the design and concept of the new 6.5-meter cruiser—Jean-Pierre Jouët began by consulting the shipyard’s renowned naval architect, Eugène Cornu. However, Cornu, feeling he was too advanced in age to master the new technology, recommended that the young head of the company turn to Maurice Colin, his collaborator of nearly fifteen years, who took on the task of transforming the enthusiasts’ ideas into a boat design. “My only personal contribution,” Jean-Pierre Jouët noted with his legendary modesty, “was to place my trust in this team, in Maurice Colin, the architect, and in Paul Haloche, head of our plastics department.” It’s worth noting that the group of initiators strongly contributed to the project’s success by ordering the first fourteen Golif models even before its presentation at the boat show.
With its strange twin-level roof, its wide windshield offering views out the front, and its very protected cockpit shifted all the way to the rear, the Golif did not look like anything that had come before it. And its 1,300 kilos meant that it was not in the ultralight boat category. But its accommodation was effectively thought out for life on the high seas. With its fine water inlets, its rear that was relatively wide for the time, its old-style “wine-glass profile” hull and its relatively shallow keel (draft of less than 1m), it was not built for high speeds. However, its one-piece build was solid and its behavior was very safe and secure.
To such an extent that the Golif saw glory when a groundbreaking sailor dared to use it to take on the second single-handed transatlantic race. This year, in 1964, a certain Éric Tabarly won a legendary victory and eclipsed the performance of “the other French skipper” in the race, Jean Lacombe. Lacombe finished 9th in 46 days on board a Golif loaned from the Jouët yard. He was anything but a beginner: he had completed a first epic Atlantic crossing on board a tiny 5.50m boat that he had designed himself (despite not having any naval architecture knowledge), before competing in the first-ever transatlantic race, in 1960, on board a 6.50m wooden Cap Horn, also from Jouët… and finishing fifth and last. Four years later, he offered the Golif its certification as a true bluewater sailboat.
The Muscadet: the 4x4 sailing revolution
However, another boat, which was the same length and appeared barely one year later, reached the summit for legendary cruisers and is still there today. Once again, this was linked to Les Glénans, as its designer had been one of the pillars of this school. His friends were always asking him to create a boat for them that was simple and inexpensive, but good on the water, able to go far offshore. A physics and chemistry graduate at the tender age of 32, Philippe Harlé learned about naval architecture on the go, putting things into practice, creating a first service unit for the famous sailing school on this archipelago in Brittany, then designing a small polyester dinghy.
With his straightforward approach, he took to his innovative architect’s table and sketched out the lines of a phenomenal boat. The specifications required it to open up the high seas to new generations, so keeping the costs under control was crucial. For this reason, plywood stood out as the best option. And this material required simple lines, a unique chine, and planking that was almost vertical, but able to be developed. As it needed to cope with heavy swells, the new little cruiser had to be solid enough to withstand anything: a compact solid wood structure, like the accommodation’s semi-partitions, ensured this quality. For cost reasons, as well as simplicity, its deck was almost a flush deck, with no catwalks and a cockpit featuring no gunwales, but fitted with actual chests. As for the Corsaire and Golif, it was powered by an outboard with up to 6hp. Weighing in at 1,200kg, the Muscadet was very easy to maneuver with a sculling oar.
The accommodation was simple, but seaworthy: two half-coffin berths, a galley corner and a half-length chart table, then a double berth in the bow. And this was all lit with three hull portholes. For the prototype, a large sardine tin was used as the template for these portholes. So, we could say that the aesthetics of this first unit were not exactly a strong point.
Built at the Nantes-based Aubin yard, the “ugly duckling” enjoyed remarkable success from the outset. Admittedly, it was not the quickest in its category. But, as promised, it was inexpensive and performed well. Straight away, it showed its exceptional seafaring qualities. Powerful when close hauled and able to plane very well when running in the breeze, this strange looking boat was as easy to handle as it was very safe and secure in rough weather. Various daring sailors were convinced and crossed the Atlantic sailing single-handed on board just a few years after it appeared. In 1977 and 1979, no less than 36 units took part in the first two Mini Transat events.
Launched in 1964 and built by Aubin until 1976 at a rate of 50 units per year, the Muscadet became an essential boat for cruising and regatta racing. Later built by amateurs, as well as professional yards (Brava today), this series remains incredibly dynamic thanks to a very active owners’ association. If we had to choose one iconic boat that illustrated the rush to offshore sailing in the 1960s, this would be difficult. But there is no doubt that Philippe Harlé’s wonderful boat would win.
The Arpège: the french-style yachting revolution
However, it would face strong competition from other candidates, including the Arpège. Here, we are moving into a whole different level of the sailing world. The Arpège was a lot bigger, automatically more expensive, and designed to rival yachts, which were produced almost exclusively up until this point by English yards. With its plastic build, it needed to inaugurate rationalized industrial production for large series. Unlike the previous three units, it had to win over a new clientele of enthusiasts, these senior executives from the Glorious Thirties, who were young, dynamic and comfortable with their purchasing power.
Its designer was in his 30s, like Philippe Harlé. And, like Harlé, he had no training as a naval architect. Michel Dufour, a reclusive and timid genius, was an industrial methods engineer. From the north of France, he moved to La Rochelle when he was hired by Brissonneau & Lotz, a local railway carriage manufacturer.
Naturally, the young manager turned to the sea and completed his first tacks on board a dinghy. Appointed to head up his employer’s polyester department, he was quickly won over by the endless possibilities offered by this new material. Before long, he dreamed of applying them to invent a cruising boat. With his daring approach, he learned the techniques of naval architecture, drew up the plans for his dream boat, did not hesitate to sell everything he owned, and even took on serious levels of debt to build his first creation.
Following a few promising tacks in La Rochelle bay, Dufour loaded his creation on board a trailer and set off to exhibit it at the Paris boat show. His Sylphe was the same length as the Golif and Muscadet, which were both released just before it. It caused a sensation. And was instantly sold on site, enabling its daring inventor to launch its series production. Buoyed by his success, and with demand firming up for a larger unit, Michel Dufour went back to his drawing board. In 1967, he designed a beautiful unit that was 9m long, which he called the Arpège.
Like its predecessor, the new sailboat received an enthusiastic response. Only a handful of purists complained when they saw the height of its freeboard, which was unusual at the time, although quite moderate for today’s standards. Some also judged its 3m main beam, which was one third of its length, to be extravagant. Various “experts” at the shows predicted that, with a width like this, the new boat would definitely be handicapped when close hauled. But the Arpège would go on to prove the naysayers wrong. This full figure, which was surprising in the 1960s, gave the hull its power and stable form. To such an extent that its designer was able to reduce his creation’s ballast weight and total displacement, which meant that it was remarkably quick. Not to mention its unmatched live-aboard volumes.
When handled well, and although initially designed for cruising, the Arpège did not take long to excel in racing events. A fearless young man by the name of Jean-Yves Terlain lined up on board it for the first single-handed transpacific race. As we know, the winner was called Tabarly. Terlain finished second…
With its attractive profiled roof, on two levels, its slender bow and its transom, which was initially straight, then inverted, the Arpège triggered the same emotions as beautiful yachts. Very seaworthy, its accommodation was comfortable on the high seas: at the bottom of the companionway, there were two coffin berths on either side of the central corridor, then a real galley and a large chart table. A door separated this area from a saloon fitted out with four sea berths. Split off from the navigation area, these made it nice and snug for sleeping, regardless of their actual appearance. The bow cabin housed the toilets and sail locker.
The Arpège enjoyed considerable success for a boat of this size. It led its designer to invent a production line approach. It saw more than 1,000 units take to the water and conquered the English market. This was a pioneering step, a consecration and also a symbol of French excellence.
There is no doubt that the Corsaire, Golif, Muscadet and Arpège all helped convert France to the magic of offshore sailing. They also changed how sailors around the world viewed French designs.