Lawson Robb’s Project Director Eva Leone, comments on this year’s Yacht Trends.

Abode 2 Magazine

May 15, 2019

As a leading global interior architecture and interior design house headquartered in London since 2003, Lawson Robb has extended the residential practise to also focus on Yacht interiors. Eva Leone, Projects Director, comments in the luxury property magazine, Abobe 2, about the new era of yacht design alongside Sunseeker and Harrison Eidsgaard.

Yacht Popularity

“Yacht design is in a golden age, with vessels being expertly conceived with both performance and elegance in mind.”
2018 saw an increase in superyacht sales with 300 sold compared to 2017’s 249. 300 may seem small, but one 454-foot superyacht costs $590 million.
Coburn & Associates predicts a rise in retail sales from $39 billion in 2017 to $42 billion in 2019, and by 2% for new boat sales.

Yacht Trends from Eva Leone

Eva Leone explains: “Year-on-year trends is an interesting subject for yachts, due to the low volume nature of the industry, we don’t see the same pace of change as the residential sector.

“We are however noticing a new era of ‘excitable design,’ where every inch of the vessel has some kind of feature or special finish.

She continues: “In the past year or so, we have also seen a selection of designs that pose as a hybrid between pared back and uber glam; a relatively un-complicated palette offset with balanced pops of colour, complemented by an ‘interesting’ detail – whether it be the shape of a surface, the transition of one finish to another, or a key piece of furniture with some real aesthetic interest.

“Yacht owners are also embracing their own autonomy on board: The way the world now operates, on an instant-fix basis, with wealth being accrued in much different and often less structured ways is having an impact on what owners look for.

“As such, we’re seeing yachts with more flexible spaces where less prime floor space is given to lounges that are never used, where dropping anchor isn’t necessarily the same place year by year or month by month, where staff aren’t necessarily so invisible and where an owner might actually want to make his own eggs in the morning. This movement could be very exciting for the industry as spatial planning comes increasingly to the fore.”