We’re past the point of no return, and the legacy of 2023 will include the agreement reached in Dubai at the Cop28, where the governments of the world’s nations made a commitment to abandon fossil fuels by 2050. A momentous turning point. No more proclamations and debate – it’s time to get serious. In the not-too-distant future all this will have a significant impact on our life and especially on our behaviour. A lot has been said and written about how sea, land and air travel will never be the same again.
That’s not enough. We also have to consider how to manage the many aspects of the transition, processes that are now accelerating at an ever faster rate. It’s never easy before any big change to abandon the certainties of a familiar reality in the face of something about which we as yet know very little. However, we are being presented with an exciting opportunity, one we must grasp immediately if it’s true that the responsibility of design is to find a response to new requirements. This is where we begin to see the benefits – just look at how the coming of electrification is revolutionising the car industry. Breaking free of the limitations imposed by internal combustion engines, car designers can now choose from an almost infinite series of solutions enabling them to rewrite the language of automobile aesthetics. The first effects of this stylistic revolution are beginning to be seen around us and their presence, especially in an urban context, is providing an intriguing foretaste of what to expect.
There’s still a long way to go in the yacht-building world, but here, too, the transformation has already begun, and seems irreversible. The most obvious effects are tangible – foils, for example, a solution borrowed from the world of sail, are finding wider and wider applications in the motor yacht industry, starting with the smallest and then being adopted by larger craft with the development of more advanced and reliable green and hydrogen propulsion systems. But there’s more. Over the past twenty years yacht design has dismantled the rules of the past and given a fresh new look to modern yachts. It was a necessity dictated by the desire to find a new aesthetic language, but over the years it has also resulted in a new way of experiencing yachts and their interiors and exteriors. Now, just as in the automotive world, the imminent arrival of new propulsion systems no longer based on fossil fuels will result in momentous changes we’re keen to discover and describe.
Matteo Zaccagnino
