“The key word is elegance. Very few boats can
make that claim any more. Modern boats are
purposeful, aggressive, macho, which has led
to them all having snub noses. They look angry.
You could paint them grey and stick a cannon on
the front and it wouldn’t upset their stance at all.
Eclipse is not like that.” It’s a familiar sermon from
Disdale, who famously posts
his 10 “design commandments”
up round his office. “One of
the most important tools
in your box is restraint. I can
have complete freedom when
designing a superstructure, but
restraint is actually the most
important thing – knowing
when to stop gilding the lily.
Don’t gild it! Use silver leaf.”
The obvious benefit
of a single designer being
responsible for the interior and
exterior of a yacht is a seamless flow between the
two, and that is absolutely true of Eclipse, whose
interior conforms to another one of Disdale’s
mantras: “beach house not penthouse”. “If you’ve
got a dining room with satin on the chairs and
gold braid around them, but you live in a T-shirt
and shorts, then you’re not comfortable,” he says.
The pool is a vast entertaining space, with 3.2
metre overheads and a retracting glass sunroof.
“The ambience of the pool is as important as how
it looks. You’ve got to want to sit by it.” Or dance
on it: the blue granite bottom of the pool rises up
to sit flush with the deck. It can also be lowered a
touch to create a paddling pool.
The interior of any
boat should be about “pure
relaxation”, says Disdale.
“People are on vacation,
people are chilled.” He relates
one story of an Arab client in
the 1980s, who he dissuaded
from fitting gold taps to his
superyacht. “I told him he
already had a 65 metre on
the quay – he had already
made his statement. It was
a process of trying to quieten
his ostentation.” You get the feeling no such effort
was needed with the owner of Eclipse. “He had
already owned three yachts to our design, so
consequently was very familiar with my way of
working and the habitat I create.” It’s impossible
to miss the very deliberate warmth of that habitat“One of the most
important tools
in your box
is restraint –
knowing when to
stop gilding the
lily. Don’t gild it!”http://www.boatinternational.com | April 2016