The story of Filippi Lido SRL traces back to 1953 when a young Filippi Lido started at Donoratico Racing Boats, a boat yard taking its namesake from the small town 250 kms  north of Rome. Donoratico Racing Boats produced very fine racing boats and were used extensively in the 1950s and 60s at World and Olympic events.

By 1980 Filippi Lido had learnt his trade and left the Donoratico boat yard to start Filippi Lido company producing wooden boats and the now familiar white and blue Filippi Racing Boat.

Success followed with gold medals in the 1986 and 1987 World Championships and 1988 Seoul Olympics. Over this period the traditional wooden construction was phased out and the new composite boats were produced using a carbon fibre sandwich subjected to a heat curing, vacuum mould construction process. Such an approach produced strong, durable craft,  while ensuring a comfortable feel while rowing or sculling, this range continues today as the Italia 2. In a bid to ensure lighter, FISA weight boats,  the Italia S range was developed in the 1990s, this continued to use the same construction process, but honeycomb was used rather than Termanto as the core material. The honeycomb - in conjunction with the heat cure, vacuum mould construction process, delivered a very light, very strong, responsive boat.

As demand for the boats increased during the 1990s, Filippi's Donoratico site grew. 1997 was a key year for the boat yard, a new building was opened at the site, but more particularly Filippi Lido SRL was awarded the ISO 9002 quality certification. Filippi considered this of absolute importance since it ensured the high quality of the boats was maintained throughout the manufacturing process. Today every boat which leaves the factory has been personally signed off at 26 points in the manufacturing process by the individual technician working at that step of the process .

The yard continues to seek innovation in design; 'movie' configurations (where the slides are built into the saxboards), tubular carbon and wing rigging are all offered on today's boat ranges. Smaller changes such as one piece internal decking, shoulder reinforcement, and rigger design also occur as a result of continuous improvement initiatives. Development is undertaken in conjunction with athletes, National Rowing Federations and in 2002 the Research & Development centre was opened at the yard  under the supervision of a full time ship scientist, the new wing boat released in July was as a result of the centre's innovative designs.

Today, the running of the boatyard is undertaken by Filippi's son David, the yard employs 62 technicians and produces just over 1,000 boats each year which supply Federations worldwide. In the previous 20 years crews in Filippi boats have achieved over 400 medals in World Championships and Olympic games.

Pictures

The front of the Filippi boatyard, to left and right of the central office are two of the four manufacturing facilities.

Part of the finishing shop, all boats must be completed and signed off here before the final quality stamp can be issued.

The Research and Development Centre where computer aided design (CAD) helps test the innovations prior to physical building.