He seems to imagine what the boat will look like in his mind, maybe do a drawing or two, and then he goes straight to building a model. Once the model is done the way he wants it and he's happy with the result, then he sort of back engineers it onto paper. Boat Design as Origami.
This is not a million miles away from the old boat-builders' method of carving a half model and then taking the lines off it to build a full size boat.
I, on the other hand, spend weeks carefully drawing, plan, sections and profiles only to decide later its not beamy enough and have to start all over again.
Cee Dubbs also believes that you should cut your suit to suit the cloth, so if plywood comes in 8ft by 4ft boards then it makes sense to design a boat which makes the most of those dimensions. Boats should therefore come in sizes just smaller than 8ft 12ft,16ft, 20ft, 24ft etc. made up from full and half sheets. Katie Beardie will be approx 15ft 9ins which is what you get when you put a curve in two sheets joined end to end. Waterline beam will be around 32ins which is about average for an open canoe of that length and intended to provide a bit of extra stability for the sail rig.
So here we are, the actual plans as drawn by Cee Dubbs.
This is the sheet for the sheer strake. As you'll see the curves are all parallel and there are only two measurements, you can work out the rest yourself. Two aft panels and two forward panels to be butt jointed. Not much waste there!
And here is Sheet 2 for the floor.
A few more dimensions on this one and some artistic curves but nothing too complicated.
Watch this space, next time we get the plywood out.
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