I built a new dinghy this summer. It was built at my parent's house and childhood home with my wife and mate Sarah and my father, Phillip Lea, who jointed us in re-launching in his highly modified Toon-2 after some repairs. It will be a yacht tender for our floating home, S/V Robin. It was built to Jim Michalak's Vole plans (available from duckworks bbs), but we made some modifications to suit our needs.

First, the as-designed 16 foot mast on the 55 square foot sprit-boomed leg-o-mutton is unwieldy on deck, so I substituted a 50 square foot sprit rig. I prefer the look of square sails anyway. The spars are laminated southern yellow pine, and are finished slightly under dimensions to either the Vole or the Slam Dink plans, with a long parabolic taper to the point. Bringing those spars down to a smooth taper with a plane and a spoke shave was my favorite part of the build, except maybe seeing them take on their final coat of varnish.
The hull and interior boxes are built of 5.5mm Superply XL exterior underlayment, and we chose to fiberglass the entire exterior ending under the gunwales in hopes of extending the life of a dinghy that will spend a good potion of its life in the water and being lifted (and undoubtedly bashed around) on and off deck in slings. The seat tops are 1/4" a/c southern yellow pine exterior plywood for stiffness.

All the framing is done with southern yellow pine, and the mast step, mast partner, the aft knees, and the skeg are red oak. I found that the red oak vented air and caused bubbles in the epoxy and ended up needing a sanding and a second coat to fill all the pores.
Also, at dinghy docks, inflatables are the norm, and other yachties aren't keen on seeing external leeboard hardware grinding against their silly rubber ballons, so I put in a daggerboard case instead of the leeboard as drawn, and made two dagger boards, a two foot one for sailing and a 3" deep one for better tracking while rowing and sculling.

I wanted it to have positive flotation and dry storage, so I put in a large up-swept box forward for a rowing seat and two enclosed box seats aft for sailing or motoring. There is also a center thwart that supports the daggerboard case and connects the three boxes.

Hope you like it, because I know I do! It sails faster than an optimist pram on an average day, and motors and rows easily. Plus at nearly 5 feet wide it is stable enough that I can almost stand on the gunwale!