While the Shipwrights' Company is 59th in the order of seniority, due to its livery being granted in 1782, the earliest written reference to it dates back to 1387, and in fact it exists "by prescription", which means it is acknowledged to have been in existence before 1199: the Company has never petitioned for or been granted a charter.

The reason for this long delay in gaining livery status is probably that the shipyards, which represented a major fire hazard to a city of timber and thatch, were obliged by the Aldermen to move down river out of the immediate area of the City at a very early date. 
 
The original grouping of craftsmen shipwrights must soon have become a "club" for the owners of the yards, and over the course of time their industry flourished so much that up until the 1870's the Thames was by far the largest and most important shipbuilding area in Great Britain, if not in Europe, providing the shipping essential to the expansion of Empire.
 
Many shipyard owners also became shipowners, and in the course of time they were joined in the Company by other owners, and by all the other professional groups which emerged in support of maritime industry - naval architects and marine engineers, shipbrokers, specialists in maritime law, insurance, and banking, and officers of the Royal and Merchant Navies. 
 
So it is today that the Shipwrights' Company prides itself on being the principle maritime Livery Company of London, a city itself the centre of the worldwide shipping industry. The Company provides a congenial forum in which every aspect of the maritime scene is represented.