Tradewind sailboats: one name across unrelated builders
On the used market, "Tradewind" names at least two, and probably three, unrelated builders rather than one manufacturer. Tradewind Yachts, founded in England by designer John Rock, built the Tradewind 33 and Tradewind 35 ocean cruisers before production moved to the Netherlands. A separate, long-defunct company also traded in Costa Mesa, California under a version of the same name, buying the molds for Bruce King's Islander 55 to build the Tradewinds 55. And a third pair of model numbers, the Tradewinds 47 and Tradewinds 28, appear in the lineup with no confirmed designer or builder tying them to either company.
Origins and ownership
John Rock designed the Tradewind 33 in the mid-1970s; the Tradewind 35 later succeeded it, addressing the 33's weather helm. The boats were built in England for years before Austin Lion, a craftsman experienced in building, restoring, repairing, and maintaining classic yachts, began building the Tradewinds under license in the late 1990s at a yard he founded on the Westerschelde in Walsoorden, Netherlands. He took over the Tradewind brand outright a few years later, and since 2000 the yachts for the European market have been completed there. Tradewind Yachts built these compact, seaworthy cruisers with a classic finish, combining solid, modern build materials with mahogany, bronze, brass, and leather.
A different, unrelated company also called Tradewind Yachts operated out of Costa Mesa, California, founded by Bob Lynch and gone out of business by the early 1980s; accounts differ on whether it traded as Tradewinds Marine or Tradewinds Yachts, and on whether it bought its key molds in the early 1970s or around 1975. That company bought the molds for Bruce King's Islander 55 — a design on which industrial designer Joe Artese had already spent roughly a thousand hours before Islander shelved the project, having built only some hulls and no deck molds. The Costa Mesa buyer commissioned naval architect Leif Beiley to redesign the boat into virtually a new vessel on the existing hull, and at least three were built as the Tradewinds 55, one of the last designs Bruce King drew to the old CCA rating rule.
The Tradewinds 47 and Tradewinds 28 also appear in the model lineup, but their design and build history is not well documented, and neither is confirmed as connected to the Dutch or the Costa Mesa company.
Who Tradewind is for
A buyer looking at a Tradewind 33 or 35 is looking at a John Rock-designed ocean cruiser with an English-then-Dutch build history. A buyer looking at a Tradewinds 55 is looking at something else entirely: a small run of heavily reworked Bruce King/Leif Beiley hulls from a shuttered California yard. And a Tradewinds 47 or 28 carries a name without a documented pedigree to check it against, so each one is worth researching on its own facts rather than assumed to share either builder's story.
