Welcome to the special “20th Anniversary” section of Top Yacht Design. Here, day by day, we present the best stories, yachts, and personalities we’ve covered over the past 20 years of Top Yacht Design, from 2006 to today.
Taken from Top Yacht Design no. 11/2017, pp. 50/57
Piero Lissoni, the enlightened
Yachts are floating buildings to Piero Lissoni.
“To produce a good design you need a good interlocutor. Otherwise it won’t go anywhere. That’s true in any sector.” In the course of his career, architect and designer Piero Lissoni has designed for an incredibly broad array of areas. He was the first to cast off from civil architecture bound for the misty shores of yacht design, crafting a course that many have since followed. Founder of the Lissoni Associati studio, he has provided art direction for leading brands from Boff to De Padova, Living Divani and Porro, as well as designing for the international likes of Alessi, B&B Italia, Cassina, Flos, Glas Italia, Kartell and Knoll. On top of all that, Lissoni has also laid his hand to three yachts: the 36-metre sailer Ghost 2005), penned in collaboration with Studio Brenta; the 50-metre Tribù (2007), built by Mondomarine for Luciano Benetton; and the brand-new 27-metre Sanlorenzo SX88, premiered at the 2017 Cannes Yachting Festival. “I don’t think you need to design anything ad hoc for ‘floating buildings’. In fact, I find it crazy,” Lissoni says. “Why should you copy an industrially-designed and manufactured object rather badly, maybe with the wrong proportions or using the wrong materials, just because it is to go on a boat? Why do that when you already have the finest of the finest available to you? Of course, you can have mass-produced products on a yacht of any size: it’s all about mind-set!” A clash of different approaches that at times demanded discussion and compromise but which never caused Lissoni any major problems.
“I didn’t encounter any issues in that sense,” he continues. “With all three experiences, I was privileged enough to have been chosen by the yard or the commissioning owner. Of course, there are occasional problems on a technical or approach level but it’s like that with any other kind of project too. An ‘outside’ architect is far less constrained and can think in a more extreme way: when you’re part of a system for many years, you just don’t see certain details anymore or you take them for granted. But if you come in from outside and look at something with a fresh pair of eyes, you might very quickly spot solutions that are really too commonplace and then improve on them. Sometimes, habit closes your eyes.” Piero Lissoni and Sanlorenzo boss Massimo Perotti had already known each other for some time before they worked together and had discussed collaborating on many occasions. But then the time was finally right and the results stood on their own merit. That first model was followed by five sisters.
“There was no owner behind the SX88: it was an experimental project,” the architect is eager to stress. “My interlocutor in this case had me on the ropes over a few things but, generally speaking, let me do my job and didn’t baulk for a second when I suggested more extreme solutions, such as using resin rather than wood for the floors, not putting superstructure around the sides, designing the ‘kitchen that wasn’t there’ in the middle of the saloon. Not forgetting a stairs that looked self-supporting. We worked hard on the arrangement, opening up the spaces, designing an enormous living area that extends out on to the deck by using the same finishes (including wood-panelled ceilings) and large sliding doors that completely obliterate interior/exterior duality. It was all about openings, basically.”This begs the question of whether we will one day see a boat with architecture by Piero Lissoni…. “I hope so,” he confides. “It’s too early to say how I’d like it to be: I certainly could never design a boat that was all curves, that simulated speed at all costs and that was streamlined in a forced kind of way. There are enough of those around already!”.
by Gaia Grassi
