ROBERT CLARK 39 FT MYSTERY CLASS SLOOP 1938/2001

CERESTE is such a perfect example of a state of the art late 1930s classic yacht that it's hard to believe the Mystery Class design was Robert Clark’s first, having served no apprenticeship with an established design office, or any training in yacht construction. Twelve were built just before and after the Second World War, with CERESTE one of the finest living examples following her extensive rebuild by Suffolk Yacht Harbour 1998-2001. In the ensuing years she’s been more racer than cruiser, with an enviable prize haul: competitive under both IRC and CIM without compromise to her beautifully proportioned sail plan. Her enticing accommodation, very easily handled rig, and the reputation for all round competence Robert Clark’s Mystery Class comes with, also guarantees that gentle or more ambitions cruising in CERESTE with family and friends will always give pleasure. With that added ingredient of the elegance afforded by a masterpiece.

SUFFOLK YACHT HARBOUR, Levington, Suffolk

2010
- New engine

2005-2006
- New teak laid deck on marine plywood

1998-2001
During the three-year restoration process, much of the original structure and joinery was salvaged and thus she remains very much as original. The extensive refit included a new teak deck, cockpit and coach roof and the installation of wheel steering.

- Replacement of all hull timbers
- New keel bolts
- New centreline fastenings
- New rudder
- New mast step
- New stainless steel floors, chainplates, and hanging knees
- Removal, refurbishment and replacement of original interior
- New coach roof and cockpit
- Original mast rebuilt and extended for fractional rig
- New boom and spinnaker pole (Collars)

Robert Clark and Sussex Yacht Works independently hit the ground running in 1936: Clark from complete obscurity but heavily endorsed by the powerful yachting press of the day; the yard from a greenfield site on the south bank of the River Adur, Shoreham-by-Sea, well funded by locally resident industrialist and yachting enthusiast Jack Rawlings - who would also become a significant client. By the outbreak of the Second World War, both businesses were seriously thriving household names in yachting with an astonishing level of output, especially of successful offshore racing yachts with names still famous today.

It was what became the Mystery Class that kick-started Clark’s career: a scaled down version of a 30 ft/ 9.14 m length waterline 2nd prize winner in a Yachting Monthly design competition. Clark was untrained, not yet in practice for himself and convalescing from a serious illness when he used a combination of intuition and crammed reading to come up with something very special. He was particularly influenced by Turner’s Metacentric Shelf theory for good balance and handling under sail, but clever enough to understand that this couldn’t be the only driving force in achieving a good all round design.

The first boat launched to the design, MYSTERY II, was built by Moody of Swanwick Shore in 1936; then from 1937 until 1946 Sussex Yacht Works launched a further eleven boats as the 'Mystery Class' became quite the thing to have. They were possibly the first sailing yachts of this size to be built in series (with a break for a war) in the UK, but with no shirking in the use of the finest of materials: pitch pine and mahogany planking on a frame of oak, with teak coachroof sides, cockpit and coamings, and interior.

CERESTE was launched in 1938 as MELODY for Cap d'Antibes, France resident Alan Carlisle. It is quite probable that, except when being worked up at Shoreham, she barely sailed in UK waters until her return towards the end of the 20th Century. By the early 1950s ownership had transferred to Léon Metz of Brussels, and this may be when she was renamed BIRBA (her name when purchased by the present owners), but it is believed that she remained in the Mediterranean, in Metz's ownership at least into the 1960s.

Possibly from the 1970s David John Hunter cruised BIRBA in the eastern Mediterranean, eventually selling her in 1989 in Greece to Michael Walton, from whom the present owners purchased the boat at Milford Haven, Wales in 1998 as the restoration project detailed above. The work was undertaken by Suffolk Yacht Harbour at Levington which has remained her base for over 20 years.

Since re-launch in 2001 in time to sail to Cowes to witness the America's Cup Jubilee Regatta, CERESTE has gone from being perhaps the least known of the twelve Mystery Class yachts to the best known, with an enviable podium place racing record participating at classic regattas on the Solent, back home in Suffolk, and in the Mediterranean.

©2025 Iain McAllister/ Sandeman Yacht Company Ltd.

- British Classic Yacht Club Regatta: overall winner 2005, 2007, 2022
- British Classic Yacht Club Regatta: frequent class wins
- British Classic Yacht Club Regatta: several concourse de elegance wins
- Aldeburgh YC: Queenborough Bowl Fast Class, overall regatta winner
- Suffolk Yacht Harbour Classic Regatta: previous winner
- Mediterranean 2015: incl. Cannes Régates Royales & Les Voiles de Saint-Tropez

- Carvel splined mahogany topsides planking
- Pitch pine bottom planking
- Oak frames
- Copper fastened
- Bronze keel bolts
- Bronze centre line fastening
- Stainless steel floors
- Teak laid deck on marine plywood (2006)
- Teak coach roof and cockpit

GENERAL
- Teak laid deck on marine plywood
- Varnished teak covering boards and raised, capped toerail
- Stainless steel stanchions, pulpit and pushpit

FROM AFT
- Teak seat at pushpit
- Ensign socket
- Chromed mooring fairleads port and starboard
- Associated chromed and teak mooring cleats
- Raised teak lazarette hatch & gas locker
- Schaefer spinnaker blocks on toerail

COCKPIT
- Varnished teak coaming
- Chromed sheet winches outboard on stainless steel plinths
- 2 x Chromed Lewmar 40 ST primaries
- 2 x Lewmar 30 ST secondaries
- Cleats at side decks port and starboard
- Deck as benches port and starboard
- Large diameter stainless steel leathered wheel
- Pedestal/ binnacle
- Shaefer mainsheet traveller
- Raymarine ST 60 depth & speed
- Tacktick wind
- Yanmar engine panel
- Shore power socket

TRUNK
- Teak laid roof on marine plywood
- Teak uprights
- 4 x Bronze oval framed ports port and starboard
- Companionway with washboards and sliding hatch
- 2 x Chromed Lewmar 16 ST line winches
- 9 x Associated Spinlock line clutches
- Butterfly skylight
- Blocks port and starboard for spinnaker guys
- 7 x Shaefer line blocks at mast
- Shaefer vang tackle
- Raised forehatch forward
- Stainless steel mushroom vents port and starboard

SIDE DECKS
- Running backstay tackles
- Stainless steel foresail tracks with cars port and starboard

FOREDECK
- Chrome/ teak mooring cleat on centreline
- Chromed mooring fairleads port and starboard
- Harken headsail furler
- Bronze chain pipe
- 2 x Stemhead rollers

GROUND TACKLE
- Delta anchor, warp and chain

CERESTE's teak interior is mostly original; a fine testament to the skill of
her Sussex Yacht Works carpenters.
- Accommodation for up to 5 including saloon settee berths
- Down 4 x steps over engine box to raw hardwood sole

GALLEY TO PORT
- Taylors gas converted gimballed cooker
- 2 x burners and oven
- Stainless steel sink; mixer tap
- Plates, pots, utensils and victuals lockers
- Weaco fridge
- Waeco Coolmatic fridge
- Grabrail at carlin

CHART TABLE TO STARBOARD
- Navigation and communications equipment
- Ship's electrical panel
- Grabrail at carlin

QUARTER BERTH AFT TO STARBOARD
- Danish style reading lamp
- 1 x Bolster cushions

SALOON
- Settee berths port and starboard
- 4 x Bolster cushions
- Stowage under
- Lockers and bookshelves outboard
- Clock and barometer
- 4 x Danish style bulkhead lamps
- Long grabrails at carlins

PASSAGE FORWARD
- Wonderful teak lockers and drawers to starboard

WC COMPARTMENT TO PORT
- Jabsco manual toilet
- Stainless inset steel sink in fashioned unit
- Lockers
- 1 x Bulkhead light

FORECABIN
- Large double berth
- Hanging locker
- Forehatch in trunk deckhead
- 2 x Bulkhead lights
- Access forward to chain locker

RIG
CERESTE's rig/ sail plan is to Robert Clark's original fractional alternative to the Mystery Class's standard masthead configuration.
- Spruce single spreader and diamonds mast
- Track for spinnaker pole
- Spruce boom (Collars 2001)
- Spruce spinnaker pole (Collars 2001)
- Stainless steel 1x19 standing rigging
- All halyards and lift in Spectra or Dynema
- Spinnaker sheets and guys in Spectra / Dynema
- Harken Mk III headsail furling system

SAILS
One Sails - Parker & Kay
- Mainsail
- Spare mainsail (Quantum/ Parker/ One Sails)
- No. 1 Genoa, crosscut Dacron (2017)
- No. 3 Genoa, crosscut Dacron Superior w. 3 x battens (2015)
- S4 X-Cut Spinnaker, Nylon 0.9 oz (2015)
- S4 Radial Spinnaker, Nylon 0.9 oz (2012)
- A5 X-Cut Asymmetric Spinnaker, Nylon 1.5 oz (2015)
- A5 Radial Asymmetric Spinnaker, Nylon 1.5 oz (2012)
- Tri-Radial Spinnaker, Nylon
Other sails
- 2 x Genoas

CANVASWORK
- Mainsail cover
- Hatch cover
- Deck cover

MECHANICAL
- Yanmar YGM30 29 hp diesel (2010)
- Whitlock steering

ELECTRICAL
- Merlin battery charger
- 4 x 110 Ah batteries with isolator
- Shore power socket and system

TANKAGE
- Stainless steel fuel tank 70 L
- Stainless steel water tank 150 L
- Calorifier
- Hot and cold pressurised water system

OTHER
- Webasto Airtop 3500 3.5 kW hot air heater

NAVIGATION
- Plastimo Olympic 115 steering compass on binnacle
- Raymarine Hybrid Touch chart plotter
- Raymarine ST60 speed and depth instruments
- AIS tracking
- Tacktick MN100-2 wind speed and direction instrument

COMMUNICATIONS
- Icom IC-M323 VHF radio
- Pioneer Mosfet 45W Car Stereo

- Horse shoe life belt
- Life jackets
- Fire extinguisher
- Fire blanket
- Rule electric bilge pump with float switch
- Lopolight mast head nav light
- Steaming nav lights
- Deck lights
- Emergency tiller
- Henderson manual bilge pump

- Custom '5th Wheel' HGV kingpin trailer
- Aluminium storage boxes
- All necessary road transport equipment

- The wheel steering system can be replaced with a tiller

- Fenders
- Dock lines

Main image: Chris Brown