NEW HAVEN — Douglas Brooks, a boatbuilder, writer, and researcher from Vergennes, will be the featured speaker at the New Haven Community Library on Tuesday, Oct. 8, at 6:30 p.m., with his talk, “Traditional Boatbuilder from Japan to Hollywood.” Brooks has lectured widely about his more than thirty years researching the craft, but in this talk he will share his most recent experiences. First, serving as boat consultant in 2021 for the recent Disney/FX series “Shogun,” and in 2022/2023 a large project building an entire fleet of river tourist boats for a company in Kumamoto, Japan.

When people think about Japan, they usually have in their minds images of manga and anime, busy urban centers, and an economy based on innovations in electronics. Most people do not know that there is also a second Japan, wherein lies a rich history of traditional arts and crafts, many of which are fast disappearing. Douglas Brooks has apprenticed with nine boatbuilders from throughout Japan since 1996, building over a dozen types of traditional boats.

In this slide talk he will share his experiences with traditional crafts drawn from twenty-six trips to Japan since 1990, visiting all 47 prefectures. Brooks’ research in Japan focuses on the techniques and design secrets of the craft. These techniques have been passed from master to apprentice with almost no written record. His book, “Japanese Wooden Boatbuilding” (Floating World Editions, 2015) is the first comprehensive survey of the craft, spanning his first five apprenticeships and including a chapter on Japan’s last traditional shipwright.

Here in the U.S., Brooks has taught courses based on his research at Middlebury College, Bates College, the University of Illinois, and Harvard University, as well as one-week Japanese boatbuilding workshops at the Apprenticeshop in Rockland, Maine, the Northwest Maritime Center in Port Townsend, Wash., in Australia, and France.

Please join us.