In 1997 I was lucky to be asked aboard John F Haslett's sailing raft expedition, replicating native Ecuadorean sailing vessels of the first quarter of the 16th Century AD, as described by Spanish conquistadores. I was put in charge of designing and building the sails, 742 square feet of native cotton reinforced by heavy hemp bolt-ropes around the perimeter, and hand-stitched at various stress points with massive needles and artificial sinew. Here we were replicating and then sailing, for nearly 1,000 miles up the coast of Pacific South America, one of humanity's fundamental exploring technologies, the sailing vessel. Today, I work on a rather different fundamental technology, one that allows even exploration by humanity beyond the boundaries of the Earth's atmosphere. Drawing posted here shows essential designs, I will be releasing larger, high-res versions of these through the Spring and into Winter.
