Vessels of Luxury

Holland, Mich.-based Grand Craft makes only about 18 of the custom-built mahogany runabouts per year.

Mahogany runabouts have been favored by society’s upper deck for nearly a century.

Before they hit the mainstream, the luxury watercraft, once favored by the likes of Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and William Randolph Hearst, were a Michigan thing  — and still are.

Holland, Mich.-based Grand Craft, one of a handful of surviving wooden-boat manufacturers, is cruising along at about 18 boats a year — all custom-built right down to the size of the glove compartment. And the A-listers keep coming. Kid Rock drives one in his All Summer Long video. Jennifer Lopez bought one for Ben Affleck, pre-breakup. Robert Redford owns a few, as does Tim Allen.

The vessels haven’t changed much since their unveiling as a civilian craft at the Detroit Motor Boat Regatta of 1923. The chrome hardware and bow-planking pattern are nearly identical and even the stain formula, 573 Chris-Craft Mahogany, remains the same. Maybe that’s why they’re often mistaken for antiques, says Grand Craft owner Tim Masek. He takes that as a compliment. “Our product is timeless,” he says.

In fact, he keeps a 42-foot 1956 Matthews Commuter and hopes to one day restore the vintage craft for use as a mobile office. That’s a lofty goal for Masek, an investor from Chicago who knew nothing about boat making before buying the company in 2005. He has no boyhood tales of miniature sailboat racing or model boat collecting; he just remembers Grand Craft as his “only fun” acquisition. “I was used to buying smokestacks,” he says.

The original Chris-Craft debuted as a 26-foot, 100-hp mahogany runabout. Such vessels had been reserved for professionals until the safer, more affordable version marked the dawning of the gentleman’s racer. That’s how Chris Smith (the Chris of Chris-Craft and founder of Chris Smith & Sons Boat Co. in Algonac) came to be known as the Henry Ford of boating. Shortly after Chris-Craft switched from mahogany to fiberglass in 1973, Grand Craft (a family business founded in 1979 by Hollis Northuis with his son and grandson) stepped in to carry on the tradition. They hired five former Chris-Craft master carpenters and began making a couple of boats a year. With the help of Smith’s grandson, they designed a line of runabouts based on Smith’s production models.

Don’t look for these wooden beauties in a dealership, though — each is made to order. The 18- to 24-month process begins in the mill room where 16 craftsmen shape planks of Philippine mahogany with old saws and drills. Once in awhile, a carpenter grabs a cordless drill. And that, Grand Craft salesman James Sheely says, is “about the extent of our modern technology.”

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