Langan Design Partners LLC

06/09/2026

Thinking of Bill Langan, on his birthday, as we take Ouzel out on her first sailing trials. He would have enjoyed today - Bill would have been in his element, and made us all smarter in the process.

05/30/2026

“It’s a scale of project that can sink a yard unlucky enough to fumble it.” That’s how Aaron Porter, editor of Professional BoatBuilder magazine, opened Sail America’s panel discussion on Ouzel, the 95-foot wood-composite sailing yacht recently launched by Rockport Marine.

In the full conversation, Porter sits down with Sam Temple of Rockport Marine and Tom Degrémont of Langan Design Partners to talk through how a project like Ouzel actually comes together — from the owners’ original brief to the design choices, engineering challenges, and realities of building a modern custom superyacht in a midcoast Maine boatyard whose shed was barely large enough to hold the hull.

As Sam Temple notes during the discussion: “The modern boatbuilder is a little different than they used to be.” You can watch the full video from Sail America’s “How to Build a Superyacht in New England” panel below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHRT1OEokIg

MCM Langan Design Partners LLC Mark Whiteley Design Rockport Marine
Professional BoatBuilder Sail America

Photos:
Billy Black (1-5, 8, 10)
Wyatt Piro (6)
Russell Kaye (7, 9)

How do you build a 95-foot wood-composite Superyacht in New England? At the 2026 Sail America Industry Conference, Aaron Porter of Professional BoatBuilder s...

05/11/2026

King Charles visited the crew and representatives of the Spirit of Bermuda this past week, taking the opportunity to view the vessel in person.

05/05/2026

Safe Harbor Newport Shipyard needed two 1,800 kg MAN V8 diesel engines removed from a 95-foot Benetti and replaced with new engines. The engine room was tight, access was through the saloon floor, and nothing could touch the boat on the way out. We designed this custom two-gantry system to make it happen. To get the full story, read our blog at the link below.

https://langandesign.com/a-custom-two-stage-lift-system-to-extract-a-pair-of-engines/

Safe Harbor Newport Shipyard
MAN Engines

04/13/2026

On March 26, Langan Design Partners’ Tom Degremont (center) joined Sam Temple(right) of Rockport Marine and moderator Aaron Porter of ProBoat Magazine at the 2026 Sail America Conference to discuss what it’s been like to design and build the 95’ Ouzel in New England. Here’s a sample of the conversation:

Aaron Porter (ProBoat Editor):
How do you build a superyacht in New England? First of all, as with any large endeavor, you don’t really go it alone. This is the team including Peter Wilson at MCM Newport, Tom and Sam Howell as well from Langan Design, Mark Whiteley of UK-based Mark Whiteley Designs, and Sam Temple, of Rockport Marine.

Tom Degremont (Langan Design):
On wood-composite engineering: "We expanded our team working with SDK Structures to come up with a structure that uses each material for what it does best. Use the material you need, where you need it."

Sam Temple (Rockport Marine):
The most demanding parts of a project like this are really management and communications. Peter Wilson was sort of the pole on the umbrella. We had a standing Tuesday meeting at 10 AM every Tuesday for three years! Sometimes they were quick and sometimes they weren't.

Rockport Marine
MCM
Mark Whiteley Design
Professional BoatBuilder

04/02/2026

We were recently involved in reducing the draft of a large cruising yacht from 16.25' to 12.5'. As part of this reconfiguration, we needed to reduce the length (span) of the rudder by 1 foot (300 mm).

However, a rudder's efficiency, and specifically its ability to generate lift, is directly related to its span. The concern with simply reducing the span is that the rudder will behave differently, producing less lift and therefore less control, while also becoming more prone to stalling. Since the original deep-span rudder performed very well, we did not want the new, shorter-span rudder to have inadequate lift capability and an excessively narrow operating range.

To address this, we decided to add area to the rudder blade by increasing its width, known as the chord length. However, to maintain proper rudder balance, the additional area must be distributed proportionally — added to both the forward and aft ends of the rudder.