Our studio is named Running Water after one of the historical NM (Northern Michigan) wooden racing sailboats designed and built here 92 years ago.

Our studio was once Dr. Mike Pierce’s dental practice for more than 4 decades. Dr. Pierce owned and raced the sailboat NM 13 Running Water with the late sailing legend Dave Irish (founder of Irish Boat Shop) and Dick Babcock for roughly 55 years. The studio owners are lucky to carry on tradition from these local legends, owning and racing NM 13 Running Water each summer with community members and youth sailors on Little Traverse Bay.

The NM sailboat is an important part of Harbor Springs history. The NM is a 34 foot wooden sloop that was designed and built starting in 1933 by yachtsmen from Charlevoix and Harbor Springs. Detroit Boat Works (aka Fisher Boat Works) produced hulls 1-17 (with the exception of number 13, a common superstitious practice in boat building). Starting in 1965, Dave Irish along with Dick Babcock and Ted McCutcheon, continued the production of NM’s both wood and fiberglass at the Irish Boat Shop. In total from the 1930s-1980s 27 hulls were built. In the mid 1960s an NM with an unknown hull number was discovered all the way down in Ohio. Dave Irish, Mike Pierce and Dick Babcock recovered this boat and gave it hull number 13. This became the boat that the three raced for the next 55 years. They named it “Running Water” due to the fact that when they first launched it after restoration, it leaked water so quickly it sank at the dock at Irish Boat Shop (you can find a photo framed of it at Irish Boat Shop, sitting at the bottom of the harbor). They let it “soak” for a day or two on the bottom before lifting her back out and keeping her afloat.

When preparing to open the studio, after rehabbing the storied fountain out front on Main Street, the studio named itself. The name Running Water carries out decades of history, literal running water through the fountain, and memories of legends from our town. At times causing confusion - we are not just a running studio!

Today, 22 NM sailboats are still in existence and 12 are actively raced here each summer. You can spot their colorful hulls moored on Little Traverse Bay from late May to early fall. NM 13 Running Water is moored to the east of Ford Park. You can’t miss her shiny green hull and beautiful wooden mast. Want to learn more about our area’s rich sailing history? Check out the NM exhibit at the Harbor Springs History Museum down the street from the studio on Main Street.

Interested in getting out on the water to race on one of these historical beauties? Drop us a message! NM 13 races throughout the summer in the Saturday NM Fleet Regattas.