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SupEryAchT rEporT
Right: Plentiful seating makes this area ideal for entertaining: as well as free-standing sofas, there are also benches integrated into the bulkheads. Left: On the sundeck, the hot-tub is separated from a central seating and bar area by glass doors.Below left: A custom screen protects guests forward on the sundeck.Below: The sundeck’s aft-facing central bar.
When it comes to designing your yacht, it pays to be
different. Today, every new-yacht owner wants to depart
from the traditional and create a boat that’s uniquely theirs. At the same time, there’s nothing like a reliable platform to inspire absolute confidence, and in Engelberg, perhaps more than any other recent debut, the two concepts harmonise perfectly. Although part of Amels’ Limited Editions range, she is also unique.
“With the Limited Editions you know that the yacht will work on a technical basis, and yet you have a certain freedom to create,” says her Swiss-based owner. The owner’s yacht broker and advisor for the project, Jeroen Minnema, researched the market and presented several options, with the Amels Limited Editions coming out the clear favourite for the specification, timeframe, customisation and design freedom required. “I’m not technically minded, so I didn’t want to create my own project from blank. When a new car comes out, you wait
one year then you buy it; Amels do 17 boats like this and you know for sure they work. Also, you get it in a relatively short time – two years, compared to four for a full-custom project – and there was no delay.”
Knowing the technical elements were taken care of, the owner was free to have fun with the boat’s look. To create the interior, and to customise Tim Heywood’s Limited Editions exterior styling, he chose the landscape architect who’d designed his garden, Enzo Enea, instead of a traditional yacht designer. This is Enea’s first yacht project, and the finished result is full of playful touches that are quite clearly the product of a new, fresh perspective on superyacht design. There’s an artistry here, a breeziness running throughout that isn’t constrained by conservative thinking. And for the owner it meant he could create an on-board extension of daily life on land, both working and enjoying downtime with close friends and family.
“For us, this yacht was not about creating a new lifestyle, but just living life on board,” says the owner.
“ For us, this yacht was not about creating a new liFEStylE, but about living life on board”
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this is the designer’s first yacht, and there’s an artiStry here, a brEEzinESS throughout
Above left: On the upper aft deck, two working signal lights and a sofa upholstered in rope.Top: The coffee table in the sky lounge is a piece of driftwood Enea sourced.Above, from left: Naval-themed antiques on board include a telescope and a sextant; one of the yacht’s many working areas; the sky lounge, with its red details, is designed for taking in the sunset.Left and far left: Alfresco dining; a closeable staircase.
“It’s an extension of my house. The furniture is the same style we use at home. I want to be in a nice atmosphere, a nice space, but still be comfortable. I don’t want to feel like I’m in a hotel – I can come to a hotel for two days, but not a month.”
Indeed, long periods will be spent on board, and the designer has set up parts of the yacht especially for working and holding meetings (the owner spent four months on board this summer, talking shop as the boat cruised the Amalfi coast). Far from stuffy offices, though, Enea’s design ensures a connection with the sea even when working, centred by an outdoor boardroom table that typifies the playful inventiveness echoing through the yacht. It’s a solid piece of wood with two levels, one end at coffee table height seating eight around, and a higher end containing a screen that can be raised or hidden. “A boat is also something that you use to have fun,” says Enea. “It’s a business boat and there are a lot of places where the owner can work, but it’s also fun.”
Perhaps the most fun place on board is the beach club. Boarding from a watertoy or the tender, guests are greeted by a colourful mosaic depicting underwater scenes from Disney’s Finding Nemo, featuring giant turtles swimming over a seabed of corals in pinks, blues and orange, and a cartoon shark chasing a clownfish. “What we wanted here in the beach club was an integration with the sea,” says Enea. “This gave us the idea for a sea mural. When you’re outside in the sea and you open up the platform, you can see the water theme continuing on board.” It’s all part of a relaxation and treatment area comprising an LED-lit sauna and an open shower. There are also a couple of shaded areas with oversized cushions to relax on post treatment, and a dive store. Outside, continuing the flow between sea and yacht, a staircase folds down from the platform and descends into the sea.
And if the deck spaces seem new and original, the interior is even more so. Take the owner’s suite, which features several firsts in the Limited Editions concept.
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ff
To start with, the space is divided into two areas, with the bed forward and the headboard functioning as a room divider, creating a working area aft of the bed. “It means if my wife wants to sleep, I can work – I am in the same room and she knows I am here but I don’t bother her,” explains the owner. To port of the bed is a drop-down balcony, again never tried before by Amels on the Limited Editions, and designed so that the breeze reaches the sleeping guests when the yacht is at anchor on warm evenings. When it’s closed, the balcony is part of a continuous sweep of windows in the hull, so those standing on the open balcony can look down and see straight through to the sea beneath their feet. Similarly, in the main salon, full-length French doors open onto folding bulwarks so guests can step directly between inside and outside.
Here and throughout, integration is a theme of Engelberg, both between the interior and exterior, and between the spaces and the hull’s curved shape. “When you walk through the axis you can see we took the full
body of the yacht and integrated everything to be round, soft, smooth,” says Enea. “It’s done in a way that makes you feel safe and cosy, but you are always connected to the outside. You buy a boat to be outside.” The colour scheme is carefully matched to shades of the sea, trees and natural landscapes outside: greens, blues and light greys. “I want to be able to step out of the boat and see it as a part of nature. This was the main appeal of the inside: I want to see out from the boat when I go through and look around, and to feel that the boat is a part of the surroundings,” says the owner. The design goes as far as to bring actual elements of the sea inside in the main salon and guest cabins, with anemones, sea urchins and jellyfish in glass. Sea stars encrusted with Swarovski crystals in the guest area lobby are the furthest the owner will go when it comes to ostentatious superyacht style.
“The big boats on the water today, if you close all the windows, you could be in a big apartment. You don’t feel you’re in a boat but somewhere on shore,” says the
Top right: In the owner’s suite, those doors open
onto a wide balcony.Top: The balcony operating
mechanism is hidden inside the desk, which is
by Metrica. Above left and right:
The owner’s relaxation area, and dressing room in
bleached mahogany.Right: The ensuite was
designed to be dramatic and dark – tempting after a
day in the sun.Far right: With the ensuite door open, the view out to sea through the balcony is
visible from the bathtub.
“ it may not be the biggest boat but it is ElEgant – understated yet beautiful. i step in, i feel homE”
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SupEryAchT rEporT
Above left: French
balconies are on both sides of the main salon. Top: The colourful
indoor-outdoor beach club. “We work from outside to
inside,” says Enea. Above: Guest cabins are themed around different
sea animals.Left: The innovative
boardroom table, with etched world map.
Far left: Shades of blue, green and grey connect the
main salon to the outside.
owner. “And the difference is that these boats have more fine and more expensive finishing, so they have to show the onyx, the leathers, the gold and silver, but I don’t want to be in the Louvre, in a gallery on the sea.”
Indeed, every inch of this yacht is designed for at-sea living. Up on the sundeck, a fun swivel chair at the front is protected by a custom-designed protective screen, so the owner can sit out and walk around protected from the wind. Further relaxing options up here, including integrated side-facing bench seats to port and starboard aft, as well as a forward-facing seating area below on the foredeck, designate the exterior as spaces for socialising and relaxing. Unusually, the Portuguese bridge is open to the crew for downtime, says Enea – the owner’s wife reinstates that she and her family are
close to all the crew, wanting the relationship during their three to four months at sea together to be like one big family.
“The crew are proud to be here,” says the owner. “They know that it may not be the biggest boat, but it has style.” In a way, his comment perfectly sums up the yacht: elegant and subtle, blending in to its environment. “We don’t need to have the fastest boat or the brightest boat,” he says. “We have created a boat which can be a part of the landscape. People notice it, but they look not because it’s tremendous and flashy or like a hotel. It looks elegant – understated but beautiful. For people who don’t have taste, it might seem a bit strange, but people who have taste enjoy it. For me, I step in and I feel home.” SyW
“ i want to be able to step out of the boat and see it as part of the surroundings, part of naturE”
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thE SpEcS EngelbergLength overall 55.00m (180ft 5in)Beam 9.40m (30ft 10in)Draught 3.35m (10ft 11in)Displacement 720 tonsEngines Twin 1,050kW (1,408hp) 16V 2000 MTU M70Berths Owner: 2. Guests: 12. Crew and staff: 16.Gross tonnage 670 gross tonsFuel capacity 115,000 litres
Exterior Tim Heywood Interior Enzo Enea; Focus Yacht DesignClassification Lloyd’s Register ✠100A1, SSC YachtMono, LMC G6, UMS
PERFORMANCE NOTESTop speed 15.5 knotsRange @ 13 knots 4,500 nautical miles
BUILDERAmels, Koningsweg 2, 4381 NA Vlissingen, The Netherlands. Tel: +31 118 485 002.Email: [email protected]: www.amels-holland.com
poRTuguese BRidge: With extra seating, for use by crew as well as guests.
heLipAd: An extra 32m² were added to the sundeck
to take a chopper.
sundeck: A forward screen can be closed completely in the wind.
mAin sALon: A huge indoor and smaller exterior area on this deck.
BeAch cLuB: With a ladder leading directly into the sea.
guesT cABins: The owner changed swinging
doors to sliding, for space.
sky Lounge: With book and magazine racks, and a self-playing Steinway.
owneR’s BALcony: To port, with a glass window
for looking down to the sea.
LAyouT: Engelberg has 30% more space in the main salon
than other Limited Editions.
huLL: In dark grey accented by that distinctive orange,
she’s different inside and out.
dive sToRe: Handily situated in the beach club area, with a
sauna and steam room.
sTAiRguARds: With added safety features, the yacht is designed to be family friendly.
wheeLhouse: With the captain’s cabin and office directly aft.
LoweR deck: The guest cabins are all flexible and have Pullman berths.
yAchT’s nAme: Engelberg is named for a favourite holiday resort area in Switzerland.
sundeck seATing: Chairs turn so guests can catch the best rays at all times of day.
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