‘All the fun of messing about in boats. Build it yourself from the kit. Easiest on the pocket and the easiest job you’ve ever tackled….. The Mirror is a true car-top dinghy. Yours in kit form for just £63.11s cash!’ So ran an advert in the Daily Mirror, the sponsors of the design, in the 1960s.
Designed by television DIY programme presenter Barry Bucknell, and boatbuilder Jack Holt, the Mirror dinghy enabled thousands of people to become boat owners for the first time. It was hugely successful in meeting an ever-increasing demand from a public keen to spend more leisure time on the water. Kits were inexpensive, quick and straightforward to build at home using plywood sheets and the ‘stitch and glue’ technique, invented by Ken Littledyke, where the panels are stitched together with wire and the seams covered with glassfibre tape and resin.
The convenience of being able to fit the boat and its rig on the roof of a small car also helped sales figures,
The third prototype, Eileen, Mirror N0.1, appeared at the London Boat Show in 1963: more than 70,000 have been built worldwide.
Dimensions
Length 3.3m
Beam 1.4m
Draft, centreboard down, 0.76m
