Wooden Kayak Company - Redfish Kayaks

"Redfish Custom Wooden Kayak & Canoe Company is Pacific North America's first established strip-built kayak company. Founded in 1992 in Idaho, our first products were strip-built wooden canoes and custom paddles. Soon thereafter we began to design and build custom wooden kayaks as well. Wanting to get closer to the salt water and the great Pacific Northwest, we moved our shop from Boise, Idaho to Port Angeles, Washington - which lies at the base of the Olympic National Park (spectacular alpine hiking) and next to the Strait of Juan de Fuca (extraordinary sea kayaking waters). However, this was not to be our last move. Inspired by the general enthusiasm of it's wooden boat community, and in particular by it's annual Wooden Boat Festival, we made our last move, forty miles down the Strait to "The Hub of Pacific North America's Wooden Boat Activity - Port Townsend, Washington". Here, in this quaint Victorian waterfront town with it's superb maritime heritage, we have comfortably settled into handcrafting some of the world's finest strip-built wooden kayaks and wooden kayak kits. If you visit Port Townsend please remember that you've a standing invitation to stop by the shop, sit down, have a cup of coffee, and talk wooden boat!"

After growing up in Idaho - "The Whitewater State" - and spending endless days on it's mountains, rivers, and lakes, and attaining his degree in biology, Joe took turns living and working in Alaska and Hawaii - here he took to competitively racing outrigger canoes - hence his affection for muscle powered water transportation!
The quality of his workmanship and boat design has not gone unnoticed. His company and products have been featured on both "Public Television" and in notable magazines such as Architectural Digest, Town & Country, Lexus, and Sunset Magazine - where Redfish Kayaks was prominently profiled as the "Best of the West"!
The level of craftsmanship, attention to detail, kayak design, and handling performance have made his kayaks much sought after - counted among his clients are The Disney Corporation and The Nature Conservancy. Redfish boats have been shipped throughout North America and overseas as far as Australia.
Several years ago while exhibiting at a boat show in Seattle, Joe ran into the director of the prestigious Northwest School of Wooden Boat Building in Port Townsend, Washington. Upon seeing his work and after a brief conversation, Joe was invited to teach the school's wood-strip kayak building workshops. Among those who take his kayak building courses are: students from the Northwest School of Wooden Boat Building, aspiring boat builders, doctors, writers, educators, airline pilots, carpenters, homemakers, retirees - in other words, people from all walks of life. The workshop students hail from all parts of North America and have traveled to Port Townsend from as far away as Korea to take his workshop.