Building a dream
The quest for a perfect daysailer led Chris Hood to create a 32-footer that has won the hearts of sailors around the world
Some stories begin with a dream, which is exactly how Chris Hood ended up designing and building the C.W. Hood 32, an elegant daysailer with the graceful lines of an International One-Design and the speed of a competitive racer.
“I wanted the boat to be drop-dead gorgeous and sail as good as it looks,” said Hood, 57, who in 2009 saw himself in a dream, sitting by the big bay window in his kitchen while holding up a model sailboat in one hand. The sleek little boat with long overhangs was spinning gracefully, riveting his attention.
“I knew that was the shape I wanted. That was the vision, so I modeled the 32 after what I thought I saw,” he said.
From the dream came the first set of drawings, a collaboration by Hood and Ben Stoddard, then a member of the C.W. Hood Yachts design team in Marblehead, Massachusetts.
“The Alerion 28 started it all and quickly became very popular. When I decided to try this, Morris and Tartan were already building daysailers, and Hinckley had made one as well,” Hood said. “Everyone was jumping on the bandwagon.”
Hood was convinced he could design and build a daysailer that would stand out from the others.
“I wanted something different. I wanted to go back to the days of daysailing in a boat that was elegant, comfortable and just happens to sail well. And I wanted it to look like an IOD but sail like a laser,” he said.
Hood already knew plenty about IODs. In the mid-1990s his company was awarded a contract to construct IOD-class boats and he built 18.
Hood’s goal was to build as pure a sailboat as possible, one meant for those who are out on the water to relish the joy of sailing without the burdensome weight and equipment found aboard cruising boats. The daysailer would be outfitted with a mast, rudder, self-tacking jib, quality sails and an electric motor, but without bunks, galley, winches and a head. As a result, it would weigh only 2,800 pounds, making it highly maneuverable and require little wind to get up and go.
“The 32 can actually turn on its own length,” Hood said, while seated in his modest office that’s tucked in a rustic, historic building constructed in the late 1800s and long known as the home of the former Graves Boatyard.
Before moving forward with actual production, Hood consulted with longtime friend Bruce Dyson, a Marblehead resident, respected skipper and master craftsman known as “the IOD Whisperer” for his efforts to rescue and restore vintage sailboats.
An hour after receiving the drawing, Dyson was on the phone with Hood, enthusiastically explaining that the design was inspiring and that he’d be coming right over to the to discuss it. Dyson said he would be bringing along Frank Morse, an old friend and Marblehead sailor who just happened to be in the market for a new boat.
Hood recalled how Morse came straight to the point.
“Frank asked me, ‘You going to build it?’ And I said, yes, if I’ve got a customer. That’s when Frank looked at me and said, ‘I’m your customer.’ So all of this became possible because of that one man, Frank Morse.”
When Hood suggested Morse come up with a name for the boat, the sailor answered with one word Dream because he couldn’t have dreamed of a better boat. Morse has since passed away, but his son Christopher Morse continues to sail hull No. 1.
Soon after Frank Morse lent his support, Marblehead resident Tom McManus contracted for hull No. 2, which was followed by another order from a Seattle sailor for hull No. 3. Morse’s boat debuted in 2011. As word spread, sailor Marc van den Kuur purchased hull No. 6 to sail in Holland. The orders continued to arrive, slowly but steadily as a dozen years ticked by. Hugo Salinas Price purchased hull No. 16, which he sails in Acapulco, Mexico. Then came a purchase order that gave the Hood 32 an unprecedented boost. America’s Cup tactician and sailing television commentator Gary Jobson took claim to hull No. 17 and named it Whirlwind.
Jobson took ownership of his Hood 32 in 2015.
“I just love the way the boat sails. It’s a rocket ship downwind,” he said. “I typically use the boat for short sails, two to four hours, with one or two people coming aboard. It makes for good, long conversation. Or else I do a longer sail, five to eight hours, and stop along the way for lunch.”
Like other Hood 32 owners, Jobson appreciates the boat’s simple, no-fuss design, which makes it easy to spontaneously decide to go for an hour sail.
Hood replaced the earlier battery-powered motor in Jobson’s boat with a different model after some discussion. The first in a series of electric motors powered by lithium batteries had been introduced in the Hood 32 in 2012. Buyers were given the option of an electric outboard motor called the Torqueedo, which is clamped to the hull, or the Mastervolt PODMaster sail-drive propulsion system that took up space inside the boat.
“My boat has a prop that feathers. It’s not a folding prop. If you turn the motor on, the prop spins as you’re sailing so you can charge up the battery,” Jobson said. “That’s a great feature.”
At the U.S. Naval Academy graduation in Annapolis in May, Jobson flew his spinnaker and tacked amid hundreds of boats during a lull in the ceremony while awaiting the Blue Angels show team flyover.
“Everyone from that fleet of boats was cheering us on because there we were, tacking our way through them with the spinnaker flying,” he said. The maneuver generated plenty of excitement over the nimble daysailer.
Twenty-four more Hood 32s were built after Jobson’s Whirlwind and four others are currently on order, bringing the total number of hulls to 45.
“We’re building hull No. 41 right now,” said Desmond Binger, a craftsman and mechanic who has been building boats at C.W. Hood Yachts for the past 22 years, hand-laying the fiberglass hull, monitoring the infusion process, and participating in the woodwork finish. “These are fine boats. Everything about them is quality.
Steve Pfeifer would agree, calling attention to details such as the wood coaming that runs the entire perimeter of the cockpit.
“Chris is a pleasure to work with,” said Pfeifer, who sails his Hood 32 Young America out of Sister Bay, Wisconsin. “I singlehand mostly and I told Chris I wanted an autopilot. He installed it as part of the other instrumentation, in a way so that there aren’t different electronics and separate keypad controls all over the cockpit. I also have the electric motor in mine, so I don’t worry about the doldrums that can sweep in here.”
Pfeifer opted for the carbon fiber mast and rudder combination, the GPS and several other upgrades.
“I wanted something elegant but with modern performance,” he said. “Before this boat, I was with the IOD circuit, then the J/24s, the 505s, the J/105s, and there was a J/22 in there someplace before I bought a J/100. But this boat fits the bill.”
Jim Issler and his wife, Heather Jeltes, are equally enthralled with their daysailer.
“When we first saw that boat sail by, we fell it love with it,” said Jeltes, recalling they stopped to have a closer look while heading along the dock to the yacht club. “The next day, Jim ordered the boat.”
The Connecticut couple previously owned two smaller boats— a Marshall Sandpiper catboat and a Buzzards Bay 14.
“So unlike many, my sailboats are getting bigger. That being said, we get so many compliments on the boat. There are many experienced sailors considering down-sizing to the Hood 32,” Jeltes said.
Jeltes enjoys singlehanding Uccello III, which she finds easier to sail compared to their previous boats.
“In the beginning I was a bit trepidatious, but I immediately found she was a beauty to handle in all winds. I so love the boat.”
David Daigle sails his 2020 Hood 32 Switchback out of the Indian Harbor Yacht Club in Greenwich, Connecticut, currently homeport to three of the daysailers.
“This is only our second sailboat as we have mostly owned powerboats. When we bought Switchback, we owned a 50-foot Grand Banks Eastbay that we used for cruising, so we wanted a daysailer that we could sail from our club with ease.”
While the boat can be singlehanded the cockpit is just as comfortable with six, he said.
“We love the low freeboard and how close to the water you feel when sailing.”
The three Hood 32 owners in Greenwich have raced at the club and are talking about a larger regatta.
Small fleets of Hood 32s have emerged in Newport, Rhode Island, and in Connecticut along the shores of western Long Island Sound. Other have loosely assembled in Maine, and while these fleets may not currently engage in frequent racing, owners are already talking about organizing a regatta. Most Hood 32 owners are age 60 and older.
The price of a new Hood 32 typically ranges from $150,000 to $165,000, depending on customizations such as a carbon mast and advanced electronics. Only one pre-owned model was for sale during spring 2023 with an asking price of $85,000.
“Most of the boats get passed along by word of mouth and never come on the market,” Hood said.
Although the boat is built without a head, causing some consternation among those who might be out on the water for longer than the prescribed four-hour sail, owners have tested some options.
Jobson lashed a portable toilet aboard for five years but claimed nobody ever used it. He has since tried a plastic-coated steel bucket contraption, but again said it goes unused.
Ruminating on the success of the Hood 32 while celebrating the milestone of hull No. 45, Hood looks back fondly on his Marblehead childhood that included plenty of messing around with boats.
“Growing up, I had a Widgeon when I was seven or eight years old. But my favorite was the IOD, which I rebuilt with my dad when I was about 13,” he said.
That was about the same time he built a tender and christened it Ocean 1. The tender with its simple design packed some surprising features for its time, including injection-molded construction, self-bailing cockpit and roller reefing.
“Between my father and uncle, we were always doing something around boats. Every waking moment was on the boat if the weather was good. I still remember there were tools everywhere, in the cellar, in the garage, starting with my grandfather, Ralph, who would always say, ‘If it’s broken, we’ll fix it.’ My father had the same old-Yankee attitude and he could fix or make just about anything. He once wanted a new autopilot for his boat, but he only bought the compass and did the rest of it himself,” Hood said.
A father of three grown children with his wife, Nancy, Hood showed similar talent as a young man. He had studied architecture but lacked formal training in boat design or construction. The first boat he built outside his childhood and teenage projects was a 24-foot Cape Dory trawler. His uncle Ted had acquired Cape Dory molds in the late 1990s.
“All of the Cape Dory boats were built so well. That’s why so many of them are still out there,” Hood said.
Ted Hood also gave his nephew the mold for the Wauquiez 26 powerboat, which was another turning point in the younger Hood’s professional career. “We built 45 of them,” he said.
Hood was building power boats shortly before taking on the daysailer project. He and his staff had spent a year building a 43-footer.
“We were just finishing up. Things were coming to an end,” he said, describing the alarm he felt at facing a clean slate. “I remember saying to myself, when this is done we won’t have anything to do.”
That’s when the Hood 32 entered his sphere and the dream became reality.
“If a boat is beautiful, you won’t forget it,” Hood said.
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