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A social enterprise has announced plans to build a new boat in a Dumbarton shipyard.

Archipelago Folkschool will be building a new St Ayles skiff as part of the Skylark IX Recovery Trust project at The Denny Tank – the only surviving part of the William Denny & Brothers Shipyard in Dumbarton.

There will be around 20 service users of the Alternatives Community Project, a drug rehabilitation charity based in Clydebank and Dumbarton are participating in the construction project.

Skylark IX was one of the Dunkirk small ships which was partially discovered and transported to the Scottish Maritime museum for restoration.

Jason Bradley from Pollokshields is the boat building project manager and instructor at Archipelago Folkschool.

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He will start delivering online boatbuilding workshops to the Alternative service users staying in Safe House supported accommodation ahead of the project.

Jason said: “I have started writing classes for service users and chatting to people who can access it and help them to get up to speed.

"It is nice because usually they just learn on the job. There would be learning by immersion in a way.”

The first virtual session was delivered on Wednesday, April 29 to introduce the service users to the project and get an understanding about their boating knowledge.

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Jason added: “We are cutting little model boat kits laser cut and we are going to post them out to them, so will can do a session of teaching them how to assemble the kit.”

“It is going to be really nice to build a boat and have members of the community and people from further afield come in and see what we are doing.”

Jason is hoping to invite the community to experience the project by creating mini- models boats that can be made from household items.

The project will run over a 21 month period with the aim not only complete the St. Ayles Skiff boat, but also take the boatbuilding skills into the local community.

“I am aiming to find a local school or community that will be up for building a smaller boat with the service users and myself.”

“We hope to get along to the Dumbarton River Festival and outreach to local schools to deliver new projects.

The project are aiming to start constructing the new boat after the lockdown has finished.