When your projects start to feel stale or boring, make it a habit to look around for inspiration. Inspiration can be found through mentors, online training, classes, boat shows, workshops, books and conferences. It can also be found in unexpected places and through chance conversations. Once you bump into a new concept or technique, you suddenly notice it everywhere. Just a little change in perspective can sensitize you to innovative approaches to your business, materials and designs.

This issue of Marine Fabricator is all about formal and informal inspiration. “Multigenerational Workplaces: Challenges and Opportunities” discusses how different generations of workers can inspire each other, and how businesses can retain workers and reduce friction. The 2024 MFA Fabrication Excellence Awards celebrate the highest levels of marine craftmanship, and the winning projects provide inspirational examples of the high-quality technical skills and innovative thinking required to achieve this type of excellence.

Björn Hallier, Bootssattlerei Hallier in Bad Abbach, Germany, a winner of two 2024 Fabrication Excellence Awards, presents a unique fabric-fitting technique that ensures a wrinkle-free front panel. Russ Griffin, Northcoast Marine Specialties LLC, walks through the steps of eliminating vertical darts by using horizontal darts instead, and Charlene Clark, IFM, Signature CanvasMakers LLC, also a winner of a 2024 Fabrication Excellence Award, discusses how to deal with difficult customers in order to turn a challenging situation into a great customer experience.

If you attended the annual Marine Fabricators Conference in January, it was hard not to come away feeling inspired thanks both to the formal instruction and the many informal conversations that occurred around the edges. Continually seeking out inspiration is the foundation of creating quality projects and a successful business. As Aristotle said, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”