Where can you place a Wharf in Windrose?

On the shoreline, right against the water — it can be built on top of the water and snaps onto pier pieces. Unlike the Shipwright's Workshop, the Wharf does not need a roof. If the placement outline is red, it isn't valid; nudge it toward the waterline until it goes green.

Windrose: How to Build a Wharf — Cost, Placement & What It Does (2026)

Q: How much does a Wharf cost in Windrose?

10 Wood and 10 Coarse Fabric. That single cost is reported the same way across four separate guides, so it's the most reliable number on the page. Coarse Fabric comes from Plant Fiber processed at a Workbench; Wood comes from chopping trees. There's no upgrade step — once built, the Wharf is done.

Q: How do you unlock the Wharf in Windrose?

The Wharf blueprint isn't available from the start — it unlocks through the early main questline. Complete 'Rescuing The Crew' and 'I Need A Bigger Boat', then progress 'How My Sea Adventure Began' until the step that has you craft 12-pounder cannons (which means building a Shipwright's Workshop first). Crafting those cannons quietly adds the Wharf to your build menu.

Q: What's the difference between the Wharf and the Shipwright's Workshop?

They're two separate structures with a clean split. The Shipwright's Workshop (15 Wood, 10 Coarse Fabric, 5 Copper Ingots, and it needs a roof) is where you CRAFT ship gear — cannons, hull bracing and upgrades. The Wharf is where you EQUIP that gear, select and manage your ship, build whole new hulls you've unlocked, and customize sails, flags and the ship's name. Craft at the Workshop, fit it at the Wharf.

Q: Is the Wharf the same as the Shipyard?

In-game the structure is called the Wharf. Some guides call it the 'Shipyard', and that's because Shipyard is the name of a menu inside the Wharf (the one where you craft new unlocked ships). If a guide tells you to build a 'Shipyard', it means the Wharf.

Q: Can you repair your ship at the Wharf?

You can recover a destroyed or sunken ship at the Wharf for a small fee — players report roughly 20 Wood for a basic respawn. Whether the Wharf also performs incremental hull repair, and exactly what that costs, is reported inconsistently across guides (figures range from a little Wood to 100 Wood plus Nails, Coarse Fabric and Ropes for at-ship repair). Because Windrose patches fast in Early Access, treat the repair numbers as unconfirmed until checked on the current build.

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What the Wharf Actually Does

The Wharf is the management table for your fleet — it doesn't craft ship parts, it's where you do everything to a ship once you have the parts. Walk up, interact, and you get:

Select & managePick which vessel is your active ship and open its Manage Ship screen.
Equip ship gearDrag cannons, hull bracing and other gear into the ship's gear slots. You equip here — you don't craft or upgrade gear at the Wharf (that's the Workshop's job).
Build new shipsOnce a ship blueprint is unlocked, you craft the whole vessel here (this menu is the one some guides call the "Shipyard"). Ships aren't built plank-by-plank — you gather the materials and craft the hull complete.
Recover sunken shipsRespawn a destroyed or sunken vessel for a fee. Players report a basic respawn at roughly 20 Wood. ⚠ verify whether it also returns onboard cargo/equipment — sources are thin on that.
CustomizeRename the ship and change cosmetics — hulls, sails and flags.

Wharf, not Shipyard. The in-game structure is the Wharf. "Shipyard" is the name of the menu inside it where you build new hulls — so when a guide tells you to "build a Shipyard," it means build a Wharf. Same structure, different word.

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Build Cost & Materials

This is the one number you can fully trust — four separate guides report the same cost, and there's no upgrade step bolted on after.

Material	Amount	How to get it
Wood	10	Chop trees with a hatchet.
Coarse Fabric	10	Process Plant Fiber at a Workbench. Plant Fiber comes from breaking bushes, ferns and plants.

Coarse Fabric is the part that slows people down, not the Wood. Stock a pile of Plant Fiber early and convert it at the Workbench — you'll want Coarse Fabric for the Shipwright's Workshop too (it needs 10 of it as well), so over-gather.

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How to Unlock the Wharf

The Wharf blueprint isn't in your build menu at the start — the game adds it quietly once you reach a specific point in the early main questline. The materials are cheap; the gate is story progress.

#	Step
1	Complete "Rescuing The Crew."
2	Complete "I Need A Bigger Boat" (this is also where you get your first proper ship, the Ketch).
3	Progress "How My Sea Adventure Began." Along the way you build a Shipwright's Workshop.
4	Craft at least one 12-pounder Cannon at the Workshop. The moment that's done, the game silently adds the Wharf to your build menu.

The trigger is the cannons, not a popup. Players consistently report the Wharf only appears after they actually craft the cannons — not when the quest is handed out. If the Wharf isn't in your menu yet, build the Workshop and make a cannon, then look again. ⚠ verify the exact quest names on your build — they come from guides, and Early Access wording can change.

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Where to Place It — Placement Rules

The Wharf is a waterline structure. It will not place inland, and unlike most workshops it doesn't ask for a roof over it.

On the shoreMust sit near/along the coastline, right against the water. Inland placement fails outright.
On the waterIt can be built on top of the water and snaps onto pier pieces — so build a pier out from the beach and attach the Wharf to the end. ⚠ verify the exact pier-snap behavior on your build.
No roof neededUnlike the Shipwright's Workshop (which must be under a roof), the Wharf has no roof requirement. Open sky over it is fine.
Green = goIf the placement outline is red, it's not valid. Nudge it toward the waterline until the outline turns green, then place.

There's no "docking" button. Windrose has no formal docking system. The trick players use: build a pier into deep water right by the Wharf and park your ship close enough to jump on and off without swimming. To bring a ship to you, use the recall (summon) command — reported as the K key. ⚠ verify the keybind on your build.

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Step-by-Step: Building the Wharf

Once it's unlocked and you've got the materials, it's a 60-second job:

#	Do this
1	Make sure the Wharf is unlocked — finish the ship questline and craft your 12-pounder cannons (see unlock steps).
2	Gather 10 Wood and 10 Coarse Fabric.
3	Open the Build menu (default key B).
4	Go to the Crafting & Utilities tab, then the Utilities section, and select the Wharf. ⚠ the sub-tab wording varies by patch ("Utilities" / "Useful" / "Workshops") — it sits up top, near the Fast Travel Bell.
5	Move to the shoreline and place it until the outline is valid (non-red), optionally snapping it onto a pier piece.
6	Interact with the Wharf (default E) to open the management table and start managing your ship.

Keybinds (B / E / K) are the reported defaults and are consistent across community reports — but they're remappable and can shift between patches, so ⚠ verify against your own controls if a key doesn't do what's written here.

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Wharf vs. Shipwright's Workshop

This is the single biggest source of confusion in Windrose ship-building, so let's nail it: they're two separate structures with a clean division of labor. You need both.

	Wharf	Shipwright's Workshop
Build cost	10 Wood + 10 Coarse Fabric	15 Wood + 10 Coarse Fabric + 5 Copper Ingots
Roof?	No roof needed	Must be under a roof
Where it goes	On the shoreline / on water	On land (inside a covered base)
What it's for	Equip gear, select & manage ships, build unlocked hulls, customize, recover sunken ships	Craft ship gear & upgrades — cannons, hull bracing, etc.

Craft at the Workshop, fit at the Wharf. You build cannons and hull bracing at the Shipwright's Workshop, then carry them to the Wharf to slot them onto your ship. You can't upgrade gear at the Wharf — that's back at the Workshop. ⚠ verify: some guides also list a campfire-proximity requirement for the Workshop; the roof requirement is solid, the campfire one is thinly sourced.

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Repairing & Recovering Ships

Here's where the data gets soft, so we're going to be straight with you instead of inventing a clean number. There are two different things people mean by "fixing" a ship, and the costs are reported inconsistently:

What you're doing	What sources say
Respawn a destroyed/sunken ship	Reported consistently by players at roughly ~20 Wood for a basic vessel, done at the Wharf. This is the figure with the most agreement.
Repair a damaged hull ⚠	Genuinely conflicted. One guide says a small amount of Wood; another reports at-ship repair costs 100 Wood + 20 Nails + 20 Coarse Fabric + 10 Ropes and says it doesn't happen at the Wharf at all; a third says it "depends on ship rarity." Whether the Wharf itself does incremental hull repair is not nailed down.

⚠ We're not going to print a repair cost as fact. The "~20 Wood" figure almost certainly refers to respawning a destroyed ship, not repairing a damaged one — and the repair numbers genuinely disagree across guides. Treat respawn (~20 Wood) and hull repair as separate things, and confirm the actual repair option and cost on the current build before you rely on it. When we field-verify in-game, we'll lock the real numbers in here.

Windrose Wharf FAQ

How much does a Wharf cost in Windrose?

10 Wood and 10 Coarse Fabric. That cost is reported the same way across four separate guides, so it's the most reliable number here. Coarse Fabric is made from Plant Fiber at a Workbench; Wood comes from chopping trees. There's no upgrade step.

How do you unlock the Wharf?

It's gated behind the early main questline. Complete "Rescuing The Crew" and "I Need A Bigger Boat," then progress "How My Sea Adventure Began" until the step that has you craft 12-pounder cannons (which means building a Shipwright's Workshop first). Crafting those cannons quietly adds the Wharf to your build menu — there's no popup, so check the menu after you make a cannon.

Where can you place a Wharf?

On the shoreline, against the water — it can be built on top of the water and snaps onto pier pieces. Unlike the Shipwright's Workshop, it needs no roof. If the placement outline is red it isn't valid; nudge it toward the waterline until it goes green.

What's the difference between the Wharf and the Shipwright's Workshop?

Two separate structures. The Shipwright's Workshop (15 Wood, 10 Coarse Fabric, 5 Copper Ingots, must be under a roof) is where you craft ship gear — cannons, hull bracing, upgrades. The Wharf is where you equip that gear, select and manage your ship, build new unlocked hulls, and customize. Craft at the Workshop, fit it at the Wharf.

Is the Wharf the same as the Shipyard?

The structure is called the Wharf. "Shipyard" is the name of a menu inside the Wharf — the one where you craft new unlocked ships — so guides that say "build a Shipyard" mean the Wharf.

Can you repair your ship at the Wharf?

You can recover a destroyed or sunken ship for a small fee — players report roughly 20 Wood for a basic respawn. Whether the Wharf also does incremental hull repair, and what it costs, is reported inconsistently (anywhere from a little Wood to 100 Wood + Nails + Coarse Fabric + Ropes for at-ship repair). Windrose patches fast, so treat repair numbers as unconfirmed until you check them on the current build.

Windrose: How to Build a Wharf