Courtesy Circular Structures Circular Structures USA is distributing this flax biaxial cloth in North America.
Sometime around 2010, German boatbuilder Friedrich Deimann built his first flax-fiber composite boat, a two-person kayak, as a project to qualify as a master boatbuilder. In the ensuing 16 years, the art of building boats with natural-fiber composites has come a long way. That’s largely thanks to Deimann’s company, Greenboats, refining techniques and materials as they built multiple flax-fiber boats and then spinning off expedition vehicle builders Greenlander and the composites supply company Circular Structures.
When we reported on Greenboats in 2022, the company was having its own proprietary flax fiber laminates woven at a textile facility in Germany and selling them to a few adventurous boatbuilders interested in reducing their environmental impact. The stuff was still expensive then, and Deimann’s crew was learning a lot about manufacturing processes with flax fiber, which is not a simple drop-in replacement for production fiberglass or carbon fiber construction. It was on them to consult extensively with clients and train them in the particulars of infusing flax with epoxy resin. But for our North American readers, it was all academic because the material wasn’t readily available on this side of the Atlantic.
That changed in January 2026, as Circular Structures USA Inc. opened a warehouse, showroom, and shop space in Roanoke, Virginia. This new subsidiary of Circular Structures Gmbh (Bremen, Germany) will be more than a sales office for the company’s flax composite. Gresh Chapman, CEO of the new U.S. company, said he is already scheduling training visits to intrigued builders, as well as composites schools interested in having their students understand how these materials work. He is also planning to produce training videos in the new shop that can introduce even experienced composites technicians across manufacturing sectors to flax. Because the material hasn’t been available in North America, “a lot of them still have no idea what it is, yet they’re experts in carbon or experts in making skis or campers,” Chapman said.
Courtesy Circular Structures RUDI is an outboard skiff designed by Greenboats and built of flat, flax-skinned, foam-core panels.
That’s exactly where he was four years ago as an engineering student at Brown University working on the school’s Formula automotive racing team. He was looking for a natural composite material that might be suitable for their car but repeatedly came up empty-handed, even after locating some obscure flax material providers in Switzerland who couldn’t be certain of their products’ properties. His university research led him to some of the nearby marine-focused advanced composites shops and the IYRS composites program in Newport, Rhode Island. While they didn’t have solutions for sourcing material, Eric Goetz had at least built a display boat with flax fiber before, and Moore Brothers had explored it with a client who didn’t move ahead on the project.
“They nurtured my interest in composites because everyone was open to talking,” Chapman recalled.
In the spring of his senior year, Chapman asked Greenboats, one of the only sources he had found that seemed to be a supplier of flax composite fabric, if he could bring their material to the United States. They countered by requiring a few months of training at their facility in Bremen before they agreed to bring him on as their man in North America.
Since then, he’s been setting up the facility and talking to schools and boatbuilders who might be interested. A handful of programs have committed to taking a couple of rolls of fabric to incorporate in their curriculum.
“We’re starting really simply,” Chapman said. “The most important products we’re bringing are rolls of two-by-two twill fabric and our [+/- 45] biaxial.”
He insists that while flax fiber has its peculiarities—it must be infused, not hand laid—the basics are quite simple. Regarding concerns about the need to keep it in super dry storage, he said, “We don’t dry our fibers at all. We store them in a facility with no climate control. The secret is to leave it under solid vacuum pressure for an hour or two before you do the infusion instead of trying to put it in an oven or put it out to dry.” During the actual epoxy infusion, “the game is maximizing your time—you want the slowest infusion based on the pot-life of your resin.”
Courtesy JEC World Gresh Chapman of Circular Structures USA speaks at a Professional BoatBuilder-led panel discussion on sustainability-driven composites at the JEC World Composites Conference in March.
While time is often of the essence in production boatbuilding, there’s growing industry interest in reducing environmental impacts and creating a better shop-floor experience for build crews. With access to Circular Structures’ secure European supply chain, Chapman is confident the time is right to bring flax composites to North American boatbuilders. Ideally, if a market grows on this side of the Atlantic, U.S. farmers (already growing flax for seed oil) could shift varieties to optimize fiber quality.
Circular Structures USA, 1840 Technical St. SE, Roanoke, VA 22903 USA, tel. 434-242-8302
