6 Impressive Highlights from the Monaco Yacht Show

“Everyone’s launching stuff, so there’s a lot of background noise,” designer Georgio Cassetta tells Galerie. “You have to be a top player to successfully create awareness for new projects here.” Casetta was sitting on the terrace of the Paris Hotel restaurant in Monte Carlo, overlooking the city’s crowded Porte Hercule and the glittering Mediterranean beyond. It was barely 24 hours into the Monaco Yacht Show—the largest and most high-powered event on the international boating-world calendar—and already the Rome-based maritime maestro looked like he might be ready for a break. Tucking into his veal milanese, Casetta reflected on the sometimes overwhelming effect of the four-day, 560-exhibitor-strong showcase. “It’s hard to even navigate the marina,” he said. “There’s so may people to interact with.”

That isn’t even the half of it. Getting around the exhibition area is only one of the challenges at the late-September fair; there’s also the fraught enterprise of getting around the city, embedded as it is in a steep cliffside with few cabs, no Ubers, and no way up or down save a near-vertical trek. Attending evening functions like Asia Superyacht Night—a major show of force for players in the still-emerging regional market—or the party for Tureddi yachts at the buzzy Coya nighclub—celebrating the shipyard’s recent relaunch as an independent brand—required no small amount of stamina, especially after a long day of meetings and onboard tours. But to take the pulse of one of the largest, most complex, and surely one of the strangest luxury sectors in the world, there’s simply no other place to be.

Galerie was there, and brought back a few favorites.

1. M/Y Bel 1 | Rossinavi

“This was a true four-handed design,” says Federico Rossi, COO of legacy shipyard Rossinavi. “The owner and the designer both were totally engaged.” Since its launch four decades ago in Viareggio, Italy, Rossi’s company has come to be recognized as one of the more adventurous brands in the superyacht category, a reputation further burnished by their major Monaco debut: completed last year, the MY/Bel 1 is a fifty-meter, five-cabin luxury behemoth freighted with custom features, including a gigantic dining room table made out of a massive hunk of piebald marble. With interiors by Enrico Gobbi, the boat made an especially dramatic impression on the dockside, courtesy of a live martial-arts dance performance on the rear beach platform.

2. Solemates | Heesen

Dutch builders Heesen arrived in town offering an unusual glimpse into life aboard one of the company’s big, lavish, lifestyle-oriented water palaces. At 55 meters, the brand-new Solemates is a superyacht through and through—from her energetic exterior styling (courtesy of architect Frank Laupman), to her spacious accommodations (with room for 12 guests), to her plush hospitality-grade interiors (from the Florence-based studio of Luca Dini). But what made the boat’s appearance in Monaco especially compelling was the presence of Rupert Connor, the longtime representative for Solemate’s unnamed owner, who cast a fascinating side light on Solemates’s day-to-day operations. “The owner’s wife doesn’t actually like boats,” he said. “If she wants something, the owner will spend a $1 million on a change order to get her to spend one more day on the boat.”

3. Lily, Concept | Vripack

Plenty of brands show up in Monte Carlo with big ideas for ambitious, designer-driven boats that will never actually get built. But the team from Dutch shipyard Vripack is emphatic that their high-concept superyacht, Lily, will eventually see the light of day. “There are some nibbles,” says Marix J. Hoekstra, Vripack’s co-creative director, referring to prospective buyers who could fund construction. “Some people from the Middle East are very interested.” One hopes they are: as seen in renderings and models, the massive, largely solar-power 101-meter experimental model will not only be among the most energy-efficient craft plying the seas, but one of the most attractive, a pure teardrop-shaped sliver with peel-away upper and lower decks and masked windows that make for apparently solid, seamless hull. Here’s hoping she makes the leap from the page to the Porte Hercule.

4. Pirelli 47 | Sacs Tecnorib

Rigid inflatables boats (RIBs) are not to everybody’s taste: the big outboard motors make for a chunky silhouette, and the impression of speed and maneuverability is somewhat undermined by the type’s workaday, cops-and-divers reputation. But for Milanese tire behemoth Pirelli, their 20-year-long association with Italian shipyard Sacs Tecnorib has yielded a number of exciting products, most recently the Pirelli 47. “They’re great in combination with bigger boats,” says Sacs’s head of sales Andrea Loro. “It’s a platform to enjoy the water.” With signature rubber-themed detailing, the boat has some fun with its very branded identity without losing a sense of Pirelli’s legitimate high-design legacy: the windshield, the chairs, even the belowdeck mini cabin have a hip, 1960s race-car vibe.

5. Andala | Baglietto

Georgio Cassetta’s big moment at this year’s show was the Andala, the Monaco debut from industry standby Baglietto. The 40-meter superyacht shows why the designer remains in such consistent demand: persuasively residential-feeling in its interior treatments, the boat goes long on details, particularly in the baths (sculpted sinks in delicately veined marble) and central stairway (a soft, textured Carrara marble). There’s easy access to the water via the generous stern beach area, but just in case the boat features not one pool, but two. For Cassetta, the creature comforts as well as the understated palette of his design are part of a major trend. “People are seeing boats less and less as a show off, and more as a place to relax,” he says.

6. Magic | Vitters

Not one of your lie-around-on-deck, sip-champagne-and-nap variety of motorized pleasure craft, Magic is the real deal: the newly completed boat from Netherland-based Vitters is a fully-operational sailing yacht, 44 meters of sleek hydrodynamic design intended for an owner (along with seven crew) who knows how to use her and cares deeply about using her right. Not an inch of space is wasted onboard: the steps from the deck down to the galley retreat discreetly into a wall, and the two guest cabins sit cheek-by-jowl with the staff quarters. Yet there’s something undeniably beautiful about Magic’s economic, functional design—especially at a show dominated by less, well, purpose-driven boats. “It’s the kind of boat that can go anywhere,” says Eleonara Pitasso, the boat’s official broker. “It can compete in regattas. Or you can just cruise in the Med.”