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http://www.boatinternational.com | April 2018Right: the two “bistros”
on board are designed
for intimate meals and
to showcase the owner’s
spectacular art collection.
Below: even relatively
insignificant spaces such
as dayheads are given
glamorous treatments
with bronze, marbles
and textural finishes
and becomes part of the wall,” says Langton in one of the forward VIPs,
swinging it to the latch, where its undulations perfectly meet those on the
wall. “You either make a door a feature, make it beautiful, or you make it
disappear.” The same goes for handles: those on wardrobes are invisible,
but ones used on cabin doors are gnarled and textural, incorporated into a
cracked bronze plate “like desert clay”.
“Because we’ve not used any wood, basically the whole interior is a
mixture of leather and lacquer, it’s really almost tailored.” Take the artfully
stitched cream leather of window frames, or the iridescent shot silk that
runs down the broad main deck corridor, printed with a bespoke
cartographical motif. A neutral palette is enriched with precious materials:
sunset-toned onyx, vanilla marble, shagreen, shimmering leathers. There
are glossy panels dripping with resin and acrylic by Alex Turco in the lobby,
and panels of velvet mottled with gold, by Sabina Fay Braxton, above guest
beds. Staircases are works of art; one with floating treads like turbine blades,
another a leather and glass form that spirals up from the floor.
This interior – where, as Langton puts it, almost every surface has
“richness and form” – melts into the deck spaces via visual tricks: organic
patterns in the Esthec decking that continue in the interior carpets; or the
bar that is half in the main saloon and half on the aft deck, a mirror image
joining the two spaces. The sundeck is the exterior equivalent of the upper
saloon – a comfortable family lounge. This massive space, with sunshine
yellow upholstery, runs from a shaded central area for dining, with a
projector for movie nights, to an aft sunbathing area with sunpads (with a
wedge shape to sit as well as lie) and another forward around a spa pool, set
low against a glass windbreak for spectacular views.
This forward end is a cosy space like so many on board. It’s that
understanding of usable, enjoyable spaces, of human scale, human comfort
and passions that makesAvivaa truly grand design. Those 98 metres just
help pack it all on board.BPHOTOGRAPHY: GLANCY FAWCETT