Located in Stamford, Hathaway, Reiser & Raymond offers four major services: sailmaking, rigging, canvas work plus a complete marine retail store, all under one roof. Staffed primarily by professionals year round, customers can build and maintain a personal relationship year after year with the same staff to ensure their boat sails as it should, when it should.
Our History:
Hathaway, Reiser & Raymond, Inc., had its beginning in 1890 when Alden Reiser relocated his sailmaking loft in Lunenberg, Nova Scotia, to Boston, MA. Reiser then joined forces with Asa Hathaway, who was then in charge of sailmaking at the Herreshoff Mfg. Co. in Bristol, RI.
Together, they came to Greenwich, CT, working from several locations on the east side of Greenwich Harbor. For a short period about 1925, Hathaway and Reiser worked out of the Luders Marine Construction Co. in Stamford CT. Throughout this period, they made sails for the titans of sailing including the Cup Defenders Vigilant, Defender, Columbia, Reliance, and Resolute. By 1930, they had established their loft on River Road in Cos Cob, CT, where the company remained until 1953.
In 1947 Edgar L. Raymond, Jr. joined the business as a partner after having made his own sails, working with Reiser and finally succumbing to his fascination of sailing. He sold Elm Refining, a precious metals refining business, and changed careers.
Today HR&R, New England's oldest sailmaker, is run by John Savage and Tom Anderson, long time managers at Hathaways who bought the company from Edgar's son, F.P. "Skip" Raymond in 2002, They maintain the tradition of personalized service to their customers and have worked all areas of sailing throughout their career.
Today’s HR&R
With experience in racing and offshore sailing, much of the design in sails and rigging today is geared toward making sailing more manageable for the leisure sailor.
Rigging technology changes often. Hathaways keeps current through relationships with every major brand. and by nature of 100 years of history and over 30 years experience by our Rigging Manager can provide more knowledge of existing hardware found on many boats than existing manufacturers.
Sailmaking has come a long way from the days when it took acres of canvas and laborious stitching and cutting to construct the proper sail. Today, HR&R uses computers for the repetitive calculations necessary to design sail panels. The laser cutters cut the sailcloth precisely. High tech sails are glued rather than sewn, but the craftsmanship of our sail makers at Hathaways is still critical to the shape, appearance and long life of our sails in the end."
HR&R staff combine business and pleasure in a manner they refer to as "leading edge work," in which they personally test materials and designs for both sails and rigging on their own boats. They focus more on providing personal expertise to their clients vs mass marketing across the country and continue to build long lasting relationships with customers and a strong following.
