Does Your Boat Have to Be in Palma to Commission Loft Customs?

No: a boat doesn’t have to sit in Palma for Loft Customs to build its package, because the workshop stays in Son Oms and the pattern travels to the boat.

Loft Customs works out of one building at Cami Canal de Sant Jordi 29, Local 9, 07199 Palma. That building is the only headquarters BJ and Melanie Simons run.

Everything you may have seen tagged to a marina in Newport, Fort Lauderdale, Antigua or Porto Cervo is a service mention, not a second workshop with a cutting table and a plotter.

The confusion is understandable. Most canvas and cover work is genuinely local: a loft near your marina, a fitter who walks the pontoon, a turnaround measured in the distance from the shop to the slip. Loft Customs is built the other way around, and that choice is rooted in Race-First Design.

Race-First Design means the textile package is engineered the way a sail or a deck fitting is engineered, from geometry and load and the way a crew actually moves. The rule BJ Simons applies to anything that goes aboard is short: “If it doesn’t make the boat faster or the crew’s life easier, it doesn’t go on board.” Once the work is treated as engineered geometry, the physical location of the hull stops governing the build. What governs the build is the quality of the pattern.

Remote patterning is the core of it. We work from CAD files where they exist, from measured offsets, and from a structured set of photographs and reference dimensions taken to a brief we supply. That’s how a package can be cut and stitched in Son Oms for a boat that has never touched a Balearic pontoon.

The clearest proof we can point to is the COVID-era ClubSwan 125 in Finland: a complete fit-out patterned and built remotely, and every piece fitted.

That wasn’t luck, and it wasn’t a one-off stunt. It was the patterning discipline doing exactly what it is designed to do when travel is off the table.

The same discipline is why a yacht wintering in New England, refitting on the US East Coast, or crossing between the Med and the Caribbean can carry a Loft Customs package without the owner shipping the boat to Spain.

Palma is where we build, and the build comes to the boat.

Key Insights

Loft Customs runs one workshop, a 320 m² floor in Son Oms, Palma, and there is no second cutting floor anywhere else. For a boat outside Mallorca the pattern travels instead of the hull: a structured remote capture from CAD, photographs and specified dimensions feeds a build on that same floor, from the same governed material set and on the same commercial terms as a boat lying in Palma. Keep reading for the complete guide.

Table of Contents

• Why one workshop, not a chain of lofts
• How the package reaches a boat we never see
• The materials don’t change because the boat moved
• What a US or Caribbean owner actually does
• FAQ

Why one workshop, not a chain of lofts

A single workshop is a design choice we are explicit about. It keeps the standard even across every job: one cutting floor, one set of hands trained the same way, one quality bar, and no franchised loft in another country quietly doing it differently under the same name.

When you commission Loft Customs, the people who pattern your package and the people who stitch it are the same small crew in the same 320 m² room. That is how the finish stays consistent from a bimini to a full deck suite.

So the model is deliberately inverted: keep the workshop singular and disciplined, and move the pattern.

That inversion is what puts the USA and Europe in the same core market, both served on the same terms.

How the package reaches a boat we never see

The process is the same four steps whether the hull is fifteen minutes away in Palma or tied up across an ocean. You can read the full sequence on the process page.

Brief, then Measure, then Build, then Fit and Refine.

The Brief is where we establish what the package has to do, how the crew uses the space, what the boat programme demands, and which materials the job calls for. Measure is where remote patterning earns its place. For a boat outside Palma, Measure becomes a structured remote capture, built from CAD, from photographs shot to our reference brief, and from the specific dimensions we ask for.

Build happens on the Son Oms floor, cut and stitched against the pattern, with the material chosen at Brief. Fit and Refine is where a package is offered up to the boat, checked against the real hardware, and adjusted for the small realities no drawing fully captures.

For a remote job, Fit and Refine is planned around the boat’s own calendar and location, on a case-by-case basis. We assess each remote commission on its own terms, because a refit window in Rhode Island and a season turnaround in Antigua are different logistics problems. None of it puts a Loft Customs workshop in a US marina, because there’s no such workshop.

The materials don’t change because the boat moved

A package built for a boat in the USA is cut from the same governed material set as one built for a boat wintering in Palma. The workhorse is WeatherMax, a woven polyester engineered for marine exposure and made by Safety Components (technical data on the WeatherMax lines is published by the manufacturer). We specify WeatherMax LT where a lighter hand suits the job, and the soft-lined SG (Surface Guard) construction where the inside face matters as much as the outside.

For coated and architectural work we reach for Serge Ferrari, whose Stamoid and Soltis 86 and Soltis 96 lines carry the composite membrane and the microperforated screen fabrics we use on tougher briefs (the Serge Ferrari marine range is documented by the maker directly). Stamoid is the coated fabric we lean on when a surface has to shed water and clean up hard, while Soltis 86 and 96 give us tension and shade behaviour without the weight of a solid cloth.

We name the makers because a race-first package is only as honest as the cloth it is cut from, and the wrong assumption about who makes what leads to the wrong fabric on the wrong boat.

The point for an owner in the USA is simple: moving the boat out of the Med doesn’t move it down a material tier.

The material set travels with the pattern.

What a US or Caribbean owner actually does

You start a brief, the same way an owner in Palma starts one, at the brief page. We work out what the package has to do and which materials the job calls for, then we set up the remote capture.

You send CAD if the boat has it, photographs shot to our reference brief, and the measurements we specify, and that becomes the pattern. We build in Son Oms, and we plan Fit and Refine around your boat’s location and calendar, assessed case by case.

The commercial terms are the same wherever the boat is. A deposit secures the slot, and the balance falls due on completion. Slots are first-come, first-served, and typical turnaround is 6 to 8 weeks from a confirmed deposit. We do not bump an existing client to fit a newer one in.

A boat in Newport is treated on exactly those terms, and so is a boat in Palma.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Loft Customs have a workshop in the USA?

Loft Customs has one workshop, the 320 m² space at Cami Canal de Sant Jordi 29, Local 9, 07199 Palma, in Son Oms, and it is the only headquarters we operate. Any Loft Customs presence you see associated with a marina in the USA, the UK, the Caribbean or elsewhere in the Med is a service mention, not a second cutting floor.

If the boat is in the USA, how do you take measurements?

For a boat outside Palma, we measure through remote patterning: we work from CAD files where the boat has them, from a structured set of photographs shot to a reference brief we supply, and from the specific dimensions we ask you to take.

Is remote patterning as accurate as measuring in person?

That method is accurate because the package is engineered from geometry under Race-First Design. The plainest evidence is the COVID-era ClubSwan 125 in Finland: a complete fit-out patterned and built remotely, and every piece fitted.

Does a US or Caribbean job cost more or take longer?

A job for a boat in the USA or the Caribbean is cut from the same governed materials (WeatherMax LT and soft-lined SG, Serge Ferrari Stamoid, Soltis 86 and 96) and runs on the same commercial terms as a job for a boat in Palma.

Those terms are a deposit to secure the slot with the balance on completion, first-come first-served scheduling, and a typical 6 to 8 weeks from confirmed deposit, and we do not bump an existing client to slot in a new one.

Do you travel to the boat for the fit?

On the fit, Fit and Refine is planned around your boat’s own location and calendar on a case-by-case basis, because a US East Coast refit window and a Caribbean season turnaround are different logistics problems and we assess each one on its own terms.

More of the standing answers live on the FAQ page, and anything specific to your boat is best handled by starting a brief.

Citations

• “Marine – WeatherMAX” : WeatherMAX filament yarns retract to their original shape after load rather than sagging like acrylics, and its ColorTite pigmentation and dense weave support marine UV longevity and dimensional stability. That is the workhorse cloth a remotely patterned package is cut from, wherever the boat floats. source
• “Yachting – Serge Ferrari” : The Serge Ferrari Group develops advanced composite materials specifically engineered for marine environments, combining mechanical strength, mould resistance, comfort and long-term durability. That is the class of coated marine textile a remote-patterning workshop specifies for a boat thousands of miles from Palma. source

Related Reading

• Race-First Design explains why the textile package is engineered from geometry and load rather than sketched and trimmed, which is the reason a boat can be patterned remotely at all.
• The Process walks through Brief, Measure, Build, and Fit and Refine, and shows where remote capture slots into the Measure stage for a boat outside Palma.
• The FAQ carries the standing answers on deposits, scheduling, turnaround, and how we handle boats that never come to Son Oms.