All,
We are saddened to report that Leendert Maas passed away on 1 June. Attached is a card from his wife Anita.
For those that knew him, Leendert was a man of many talents and we were never surprised to find out about some new talent that he had, or an out of the box idea that he was working on and in conversation with him; just a broad spectrum of intellect.
Leendert joined the Neil Pryde group in the 80's and throughout our relationship he brought a really broad spectrum of sails, boats and even architectural jobs to the group. He was a great sailmaker, artist, inventor and father and husband.
He will be missed.
And as an illustration of his forward thinking; in the early 2000's he worked with an owner of a Standfast 51(designed by his cousin Frans) to modify the boat to include a bow sprit (!) for off the wind sails and had us build BLACK sails that required us to work with the supplier to get an aramid laminate this black...but the results were great and though black sails are all the de rigueur nowdays, this was hardly the case 16 years ago!