A BOAT crafted from 1,200 pieces of wood, including fragments from the Mary Rose and Jimi Hendrix’s guitar, was launched yesterday as part of a national art project to mark the Olympics.

Created as a ‘floating collage of memories’, The Boat Project has been funded by the Arts Council England’s Artists’ Taking the Lead project as part of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad.

The artists behind the idea, Gary Winters and Gregg Whelan, known as Lone Twin, visited Portland Marina last October and 19 other locations across the region to seek out donated material to build the vessel. The only requirements were that the items were made from wood and had a story behind them.

Diverse contributions included a plank from the London 2012 velodrome, hockey sticks, a Victorian policeman’s truncheon, large Second World War crates and a hairbrush used by a make-up artist at Pinewood Studios in the 1960s.

The yacht, which took a year to build and can reach speeds in excess of 20 knots, will visit locations along the south coast before arriving in Weymouth in time for the home Games in August.