Sailing Magazine dedicated a full feature to the launch of Italmas, a 44-foot cold-molded wooden sloop built by Van Dam Custom Boats and designed by Stephens Waring Yacht Design — and the headline said it all: “Wizards of Wood.”
Italmas, named after a wildflower from Russian folklore, was built to feel like a timeless classic while incorporating every modern advancement available. Her hull — two diagonal layers of western red cedar veneers sandwiched with Sipo mahogany — weighs just 28,000 pounds despite her size. She carries 1,084 square feet of sail and a carbon fiber roller-furling boom housed within a custom wooden spar. She draws 7 feet on a bulb keel and sails Lake Charlevoix as if she belongs to another, more graceful era.
The feature explored not just the boat, but the Van Dam philosophy: that the client is the “ultimate vision holder,” that no idea is too large or too small to bring to the table, and that the challenge of interpretation is what makes each build so compelling. Every piece of metal aboard — stanchions, davits, portholes, the radar arch — was fabricated in-house. Even the dinghy was cold-molded by the Van Dam crew.
“I don’t want to build the most boats,” Ben Van Dam told Sailing Magazine. “I just want to build the best boats.” Italmas is the proof.