It's a match worthy of a Jules Verne fantasy: the venerable Hamburg-based naval architecture shipyard, Blohm+Voss, maker of submarines and all sorts of serious ships, hired Zaha Hadid Architects of London to design a quintet of super yachts 90 meters long in an aquadynamic test of her aerodynamic architecture. Her designs, famous for floating on air, take like a swan to water. Her computers also take to their shipbuilding programs seamlessly.
Hadid, Hon. FAIA, has produced extreme yachts that set a new standard for sybaritic luxury and performance. With a webbed exoskeleton spraying from the prow toward the stern, the webbing forms a trellis that acts like the roof of a convertible, supporting fabrics that open and close for sun and shade over the decks and pool. The trellis also structures the yacht's three stories, which sleep 12 passengers; 30 crew members lodge below. The interior is as streamlined as the exterior, flowing fluidly between outside and inside. A spiral staircase connects floors furnished with the curvilinear forms of her collection of furniture and lamps, adapted here for nautical use.
The yachts cruise at a speed of 14 knots, with a maximum speed of 16 knots. But performance climaxes in the bedrooms where forms swirling deliriously around the outsize beds set up great expectations.
As J.P. Morgan reportedly once said about yachts, if you have to ask how much they cost, you can't afford one. Mainly for oligarchs.
Zaha Hadid Architects and Moka-Studio produced the following animation of the Unique Circle Yachts for Blohm+Voss Shipyards:
For more images and information about the Unique Circle Yachts, please visit ARCHITECT Magazine's Project Gallery.
