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Dione was built over two years, between the autumn of 1957 and the spring of 1959, for the then Commodore of the Royal Swedish Yacht Club, Ola Wettergren. The lead designer was Olle Enderlein with significant input from Rod and Olin Stephens who were good friends of Ola Wettergren. It is no coincidence that Dione has striking similarities to Anitra, designed by Sparkman & Stephens and the only Swedish yacht ever to win the Fastnet Race. She was built in the Gronsta yard at Lidingo, just outside Stockholm and only ¾ mile from Ola Wettergren's house. Supervised by Mr Schold, the work was carried by three, sixth generation Estonian shipwrights and two Swiss cabinetmakers. Her hull planking is glued, all cut from a single Honduras mahogany tree, and fixed to laminated oak frames. The deck is teak on a plywood sub-deck. The original spruce spars were replaced with aluminium in the late seventies but there are now plans to re-fit timber spars with stainless steel fittings over the winter 05/06. The turtle-back coach-house and hatches are teak and much of the fine interior is in walnut. At one time Dione was surveyed by Gustaf Plym of the Swedish boatbuilders Bengt Plym, who built many beautiful wooden boats, including Capricia and Baracuda. He wrote that Dione is one of the best built wooden boats in the world. In 1961 and 1963 Ola Wettergren was captain of the Swedish Admirals Cup team and brought Dione to the Solent to race against the likes of Stormvogel, Zwerver and Outlaw. In the Baltic during the sixties and early seventies Dione and Ola Wettergren had a hugely successful racing career, winning the Round Gotland on several occasions, amongst a haul of over 75 challenge trophies. Dione was designed not only to race but also as a yacht to take the Wettergren family on their summer cruises around the Stockholm archipelago. Full size mock-ups of the interior were made at the Wettergrens house to ensure all aspects worked perfectly. Ola Wettergren writes: “for example the bunk high up was a bit too low so the girls could not sit in the bed and make their hair so I lowered it a bit.”
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FOR SALE
An interesting feature of her interior is the saloon table, which has inlay work depicting the Vasa (or Wasa), the Swedish warship built for the king that capsized and sank within 300m of the quayside on 10th August 1628. The wood used was given to Ola Wettergren by his friend, Karl Franzen, who discovered the Vasa at the bottom of Stockholm harbour in 1954. The wood was part of a “plug” brought to the surface before the ship was raised. The other vessel depicted is the Pamier, one of the last, great, grain square riggers. Dione remained in her original ownership until 1976, when she was sold to Ireland. She cruised extensively, including to the South of France. In 1981 she was sold again and moved to Scotland, with cruises to Ireland and the Cantabrian coast of Spain. In 1988 Dione was purchased by Howard Bryan, who, with his family, cruised extensively in Scotland, Norway, Ireland and the Baltic. He took Dione back to Stockholm on two occasions to race in the Gotland Rund and other Classic Yacht Regattas. In 2000 she won the Scottish Offshore Championship against all comers. In 2001 Howard Bryan and his family sailed her non-stop from Largs to northern Norway, to visit the Lofoten Islands. In December 2004 Dione was purchased
by Jeffrey Streule. After a refit at Berthon she will be based
in Lymington with longer term plans to race and cruise in both
the Baltic and Mediterranean.
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