An Sulaire is a replica of the clinker-built Ness skiffs of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Men went to sea in these open boats, sometimes for days at a time, to hunt herring. Their kind had disappeared from the waters of the Nothern Minch. They lived on only in the memories a few... and even fewer who had sailed them.

The men who built the Ness boats kept the patterns for building them in their heads. There was no blue prints or plans. John Murdo Macleod, Master Boat-builder of Ness learned his trade from his father and grandfather, the last boat-builder who built these boats commercially.

Sam Maynard filmed the building of An Sulaire for the BBC so that a record of this dying skill is kept for the future. John Murdo built the boat to fulfill the ambition of building a full size sgoth and to create a living link with the maritime history of Lewis.

The images in this gallery, used with the permission of Sam Maynard, are a record of the building of An Sulaire. From the choosing of the trees in Cawder Forest, Strathpeffer to her lauch in December 1994, they record the fashioning of her timbers and a skill that is passing into history.

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