Peter Lynn

Who is Peter Lynn?

Peter Lynn is a New Zealand kitemaker, engineer and inventor. He is notable for his construction of the world's largest kites, giant inflatable display kites, the popularisation of kite buggying and contributions to the development of power kiting and kitesurfing. He spends much of the year travelling worldwide and displaying his kites at International Kite Festivals.

Lynn, together with his wife Elwyn, established a kite business at Ashburton, New Zealand, in 1973, producing single-line kites for children. In 1974 he developed the Peter Lynn Triangular box kite, a framed triangular form cellular single line kite. Beginning in 1984 with the Centipede design, he then developed large creature-themed display kites for the growing number of international kite festivals. These large-scale sparless kites include the manta ray, octopus, puffer-fish, gecko and trilobite.

In 1987 he began developing power kites for traction uses, and designing boats, buggies, boards and snow sleds to use with them. The sport of kite buggying in its modern form began from a kitesailing craft he developed. It was equipped with three 'skis' and was quite unsuccessful on the water. In 1990 he converted it to a land buggy by replacing the skis with wheels. More than 10,000 of his buggies are now in use, and there are also many other kite buggy manufacturers. Kite buggying has become a popular world wide sport.