Yacht Designer – the importance of a yacht designer
Why we need yacht designers ? The designer in general, the product designer, the designer of houses or interior designers, the designer of automobiles and private jets … the boat designer.
…. Probably none today, because we are in the era of appearance, of pure aesthetics more than anything else … we are in the social age, where we must appear more than being, where selfie dominate posts and where the content is more important than content.
Never as in our days design has taken on such an important role, and today there are so many designers and aesthetes who are proposing themselves in an increasingly competitive market. Being a designer is not so immediate, it is not enough to write it on your business card, involves a path of growth and acquisition of knowledge, skills. Being a designer is not for everyone, it takes a lot of creativity, ignition, ability to see the shapes before they are shaped … The designer is a specialist, able to dress what has a function, there are designers of cars , of airplanes, of objects … of boats. I think the boat designer differs from the others because of the need to have in his cultural background, a series of very technical skills, including hydrodynamics, aerodynamics, seafaring …
There have been and there are still virtuous examples of designers coming from sectors outside the yachting that have developed yachts of great interest, even and perhaps above all media; many have been criticized, others have been reevaluated with time, but many have generated styles that reported in yachting, evident strains deriving from their cultural baggage, linked to the sector of their origin. The yacht designer is a profession, a designer does not limit himself to dressing an object, but must know its functions in depth. Who would like to sail on an aesthetically pleasing but functionally uncomfortable, or dangerous, yacht? (remember that the yacht is a dynamic element, that moves and as such, it incurs in adverse sea and weather conditions).
Of course there are the classification rules that then downsize the projects and bring back the stylistic wishes on a technically acceptable plan. The yacht designer, now knows these technicalities, and from the first moment he picks up the pencil, draws knowing what functions, regulations will stay above his project and will bind it. At the university, several years ago, they taught us that the design process in yachting is circular … we start from an idea developed in pencil on a sheet of paper, develops, adapts to the function, occurs with the regulations, we adapt, and we start again with the pencil … the circle of revisions is continuous and provides continuous external interventions, starting from suppliers up to the judgment of the owner / customer.
Who designs on paper not only has to develop everything in 3D modeling but must also clash with the reality of the construction site to solve the thousand and one problems for which even the style, shape and aesthetics have a great value. I remember that Carlo Riva, required that all the scres of his boats were all precisely positioned and aligned, this is a synonym of sure precision, attention to detail but also of great aesthetic sense … the designer pays attention also and above all to these details. I like to remember when I received the compliments for the details, and the shape of simple swimming ladder … it seems insignificant, but the owner has noticed perhaps more than anything else of his new 38mt, the practicality and comfort of an apparently banal swim ladder. Why did not want a commercial one? because whoever has the possibility to create a custom yacht, also wants that its ascent from the water is unique …
Article Credits : Arch. Mattia Massola Taliacarne
