The Alden design office was founded by John G. Alden in 1909 and his design office was, by 1932, known worldwide. This was in part due to his “Malabar” schooner design’s sucesses on the offshore racing scene, and in part due to the broad range of exceptional and seaworthy boats he designed. His designs have become true classics.. His signature yacht name was the Malabar
Alden gave the name Malabar Jr and Malabar Sr to class yacht designs. Records from Alden studio record a number of slightly different designs for the two names used over the years. The design 0691 Malabar Jr was used for 28 class racing yachts and the 0017 design Malabar Sr saw 27 built. These Malabar Jr and Malabar Sr vessels were built between 1925 and 1961. Clearly these were popular class racing vessels.They ranged in length from 29′ 6″ to 33′ 3″ depending the design number and year. Sloop, yawl and ketch rigs were produced.
The much more famous Malabar I through Malabar XV named yachts were all designed by, built for, owned by and raced by John G. Alden. The database of Alden’s designs shows that he owned 20 Yachts of his own design. (excluding dories and dinghies) Of these 15 were the Malabar series Malabar I to Malabar XV. A full list of Alden’s own yachts can be found here.
The parent corporation to John G. Alden of Massachusetts decided in 2008 to close the Alden offices and donate the Alden design collection to MIT’s “Hart Nautical Collection”. The transfer is expected to be completed over the next 12 to 18 months.
Niels Helleberg Yacht Design (NHYD, LLC) has, during the transition period, been authorized to provide the yachting community with the services formerly provided by the Alden Design office and has full access to all of John Alden’s yacht designs. The use of the Alden logo is by their permission.
Niels Hellenberg has made a complete table of Alden designs available. There are over 2400 designs listed. These are represented by over 4000 documents boats built.
The link below is to a simplified version of this extensive list and takes some time to load
Click here to view a simplified data list of Alden designs.
The link below will commence a download of a csv file that is very comprehensive. It will require some experience in setting columns in excel to make it readable.
Click here for the csv download