Pond Yacht Antiques

Star Productions were  founded by a First World War Belgian refugee Franz Marie Denye. Having worked in the  Liverpool dockyards during the war once hostilities ceased he set up Star  Yachts to manufacture a large range of wooden pond yachts and other children’s  toys. He and his family continued production until the compulsory purchase of  the factory forced closure in 1990.

 

The range of yachts and motor boats produced by Star was considerable in size and whilst there were many models  which were consistent throughout the 70 years others varied enormously. Many can only be described as seaside or bath  toys whereas others were serious sailing yachts made only to order. What makes  collecting Stars even more interesting is that it appears few records were kept  of many of these yachts. Sometimes this makes dating particular yachts  difficult. The situation is complicated further by the fact that Star also  produced  boats for other manufacturers for example fishing  boats for Lines Bros/Triang.

 

It is said that “imitation  is the sincerest form of flattery” so there is a certain irony in the fact that  following the demise of Star the Chinese started to reproduce some of the  models. These were sold both in this country and North America.

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