Walter Reeks

At the heart of Australian yachting’s heritage is naval architect, entrepreneur and yachtsman Walter Reeks (1861 -1925). His involvement with Australian yachting was wide-ranging, recognised as a premier yacht designer and talented skipper who also played a strong role in administration.  

Born in Christchurch England in 1861, he combined his technical schooling and interest in sailing to embark on a professional naval architecture career. A practical boat yard apprenticeship led toan office position learning fromyacht designer and naval architect Alex Richardson, a contemporary and rival to both Wm Fife and GL Watson.  

Reeks came to Australia in 1885 only 24 years old, and set up an office in Pitt St, Sydney. He was probably the first full-time professional naval architect in the colonies, and produced a great many successful commercial and recreational designs over the next 40 years, often featuring a personal and unorthodox approach.To get there, sharing his father’s entrepreneurial drive, he established his credentials by significantly improving some of the local racing yachts while joining both the RSYS and SASC, thereby establishing a network of contacts. New design commissions soon followed.  

From 1887 to the mid-1890s he was the county’s master of racing yacht design, with yachts in every colony or state.  Early on he created the first big racing and cruising yachts designed and built in Australia, Era, Miranda, Volunteer, Iduna and Thelma. Launched in 1887, the 70 ft long Era is understood to be the first yacht to be designed and built anywhere in the world to the new Waterline Length and Sail Area rule. 

In the 1909 Sayonara Cup regatta he skippered Thelma, then 20 years old and updated with a deeper keel to suit the new Linear Rule, but lost a very close fought event to the Fife designed Sayonara 2-1. 

In the early 1890s he designed four yachts to help create the 2 ½ rater fleet for Sydney Harbour. In 1897 he was trying to establish the first one-design class in Australia, with the 18-foot Taipo at SASC.  

When he designed the successful 22-footer half-decked Varuna 1890, it was the first Sydney Harbour open boat design created from plans rather than by the traditional builder’s1/2model, evolutionary process.  

In 1889 the breadth of his talent stood out. Concurrently  he designed a huge 90ft waterline length yacht to potentially challenge for the America’s Cup while drawing plans for a 2-foot model racing skiff.  

He was proud to call his designs Australian. Interviewed in late 1888, he said his designs “have more beam and less draught” than the English counterparts, and although schooled in yacht design in England, he had not built “a single English boat since I went to Australia”    

Reeks lived in Mosman Sydney, and served in various capacities in a number of Sydney sailing clubs. He was the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron’s honorary measurer for over 40 years and vice commodore from 1906 to 1910.  

Playing  a strong advisory role on sailing committees, he helped establish the rules for the Forster Cup series raced by the 21-Foot Restricted class, where he showcased his unorthodox design side to the full.  The single-chine San Pan in 1925 had one of the first Bermudan mainsails, and with its mast stepped aft of midships taking advantage of the headsail rule measurements, it carried a huge sail area. 

In the early 1890s  inthe opposite of the traditional process where working boats became the basis for recreational racing classes, he adapted his yacht designs to the commercial pearling luggers in Torres Straitand this became their standard concept for decades. 

Australia’s sailing traditions owes much to Walter Reeks, whose many roles and pioneering spirit set standards that helped develop our yachting success to the internationally recognised level it has now become.