Yachts International Fall 2024

Offshore passages in a small boat can range from sedate and benign to downright dangerous and vomitous. Among the top determinants of how a trip goes are the seaworthiness of the boat you’re on, the amenities it has and, of course, the weather and sea conditions. I’ve made three trips to Bermuda from New England over the years. The contrasts among the passages reflect the evolution of equipment—primarily electronics—and my own yachting experience. The first two were more like camping. The most recent was akin to glamping. My first trip to the “Onion Patch” was in 1980 on a 56-foot, homebuilt ferro-cement ketch, which, while sturdy, comfortable and beautifully fitted out, was far less sophisticated than my most recent ride. We left Scituate, Massachusetts, that October for the tiny beauty…

Throughout their marriage, Bob and Amy Book have enjoyed a love affair with the water. They see no better place than their yacht to spend quality time with their kids, grandchildren and friends. They have covered a lot of territory, cruising throughout the Bahamas, Caribbean, Mediterranean and beyond. This summer, they are aboard Book Ends, their 19th yacht of the same name. Book Ends is a 164-foot (50-meter), all-aluminum, semi-displacement motoryacht. She is the second hull in Heesen’s 50-meter aluminum series, with a sporty exterior design by Frank Laupman of Omega Architects. The Books made their mark by customizing the interior design. “You want a story no one else has?” Bob Book asks. “Well, I’ll tell you: Getting this yacht built was quite a soap opera.” When Book says something…

Hans Georg Näder, the owner of Baltic Yachts, has been a die-hard sailor since the age of 7. Last year, he hung up his sails in favor of an explorer yacht. His 190-foot (58-meter) Pink Shadow is the third hull in Damen’s SeaXplorer series, and the first hull built at the yard’s facility in Antalya, Turkey. It all began in 2020, when Näder took delivery of the original Pink Shadow, a 150-foot (45.6-meter) Damen support vessel for his 176-foot (53.9-meter) Baltic sailing yacht Pink Gin VI, the world’s largest carbon-fiber sloop. The support vessel’s space and cruising capability impressed him so much that he sold both boats, and, in August 2023, took delivery of his SeaXplorer 58. Pink Shadow is the first model with a sheltered foredeck for guest comfort…

American entrepreneur Josh Golder owned 13 production boats before he built his first custom yacht. The 154-foot (47-meter) King Benji encapsulates everything he wants: crazy adventures, a real connection to the outdoors, and every toy imaginable. It’s also the second-largest vessel that Turkish shipyard Dunya Yachts has built. The 40-something hedge fund manager bought his first boat, an Azimut 84, in 2009. “I’ve always wanted to spend more time on the water, so I bought a boat and moved to Miami,” he says. In his first year of ownership, he spent more than 270 days on board. “I don’t do half measures, so I soon became obsessed with all the good things about the boat, all the bad things, and how I would do it myself,” he says. He experimented…

Teignbridge Propellers, near the seaside town of Torquay on England’s south coast, has been designing and manufacturing propellers and stern gear for half a century. Having started out serving commercial ships and workboats, Teignbridge also operates at a higher level with military vessels and large yachts. It’s one of few such companies with its own foundry, and its manufacturing takes place in a historic brick building built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the great civil and mechanical engineer. Aptly, Brunel also designed the SS Great Britain, the first propeller-driven, iron-hulled ship to cross the Atlantic, in 1845. Today, marine propellers come in every shape and size, but they all convert rotational motion into thrust by producing a pressure difference in the surrounding water. Historically, their design has been driven by trial…

Sheer size can be a yacht designer’s friend. It can also be an enemy. The same goes for the interior design and layout. Nobody wants to take credit for a yacht that ends up looking like a wedding cake on the outside and a hotel lobby on the inside. London-based studio Bannenberg & Rowell avoided all these pitfalls as the exterior and interior designers of the Freire Renaissance, which tops 367 feet (112 meters) in length and has an interior volume of 7,200 gross tons. Able to sleep 36 guests under Passenger Yacht Code regulations, the yacht charters with 45 crew for an eye-watering $3 million weekly base rate through Burgess Yachts. “If you’re going to build a very big yacht like Renaissance, you can’t just scale up the specification…