A thoroughbred that turns heads
When the 2025 Newport International Boat Show wrapped up, one vessel had made a deeper impression than almost anything else on display. The Hinckley Picnic Boat 39, drawn by Massachusetts naval architect Doug Zurn, claimed both Best New Boat Overall and Best New Powerboat Under 45ft. The double win confirmed that Hinckley's grip on the Downeast aesthetic, those long composed lines, the unhurried elegance, the quiet sense of purpose, remains as firm as ever, nearly three decades after the style first captured the boating world's imagination.
For many New Zealanders, the term "picnic boat" still raises an eyebrow. Locally, a vessel of this type tends to be called a weekender or a day cruiser, but the underlying appeal is identical: a beautifully finished, thoroughly practical boat suited to short coastal passages, harbour wandering, and lazy hours at anchor with friends. The Picnic Boat 39 slots neatly into that world, making sense to a lifelong sailor and to a powerboater seeking something with genuine character in equal measure.
Doug Zurn describes his creation as "everything that makes boating special — timeless beauty, excellent performance, and the simple joy of sharing time on the water." Those words are hard to read without thinking of a New Zealand summer on the water.
Beneath the Picnic Boat 39's graceful sheerline sits a thoroughly contemporary package. Lightweight composite construction keeps the hull responsive and efficient, while advanced jet propulsion and joystick control mean the boat handles with a precision its classic exterior gives no hint of. That combination of old-world form and new-world engineering proved persuasive well before the first hull was launched: 25 units had been sold before the boat ever touched the water.
The Downeast idiom has spread well beyond Maine. Australia's Palm Beach Motor Yachts, with models such as the Palm Beach 45, offers its own take on the style, reinterpreting the long-decked launch formula through a distinctly Antipodean lens. Where Hinckley draws on its deep New England heritage, Palm Beach brings hand-laid teak, light and efficient hulls, and a sensibility shaped by the waters of the Southern Hemisphere. The two builders share common ground: both are committed to craftsmanship, both design for families and coastal cruising, and both have found enthusiastic audiences among boaters who refuse to accept that elegance and practicality are mutually exclusive.
That same set of values has taken root in New Zealand. Dibley Yacht Design has embraced the picnic boat concept with a locally built range that reflects distinctly Kiwi priorities. The emphasis falls on a generous, sociable cockpit and on the kind of seamless indoor-outdoor connection that New Zealand's climate encourages. As the designer notes, New Zealanders spend far more time outside than their northern counterparts, so cockpit living takes precedence over interior accommodation, a distinction that sets the local interpretation clearly apart from its American equivalent.
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A quiet kinship exists between the craftspeople at Hinckley and the designers working along New Zealand's coastline. Both traditions place craftsmanship above excess and favour practical elegance over spectacle. Whether it is a Picnic Boat 39 sweeping across Narragansett Bay or a Palm Beach 45 slipping out through the Bay of Islands, the spirit is consistent: boating kept simple, kept beautiful, and kept for the people worth sharing it with.
