5 June 2015

Combining elegance and performance is a demanding challenge for the boat designer. To meet it successfully a sure hand and a team equal to the task are indispensable. This is what has happened with the A44, an all Italian gem of thirteen meters built by the Advanced Yachts yard that offers a wonderful blend of style and performance. The aesthetic side was entrusted to the Milanese studio Nauta Design, run by Massimo Gino and Mario Pedol, which has designed deck and interiors with a minimalist taste and attention to functionality. The optimization of the hull is the work instead of Roberto Biscontini, a designer who has already shown what he is capable of with the masterpieces of the America’s Cup. The result is a combination of potent waterlines with ample spaces on board: the hull is striking for its maximum beam (a width of 4.25 meters, from amidships to stern) and for the chine that allows the vessel to “lean,” limiting its heeling and giving it more headway. Another aspect to which Biscontini has given absolute priority is lightness: the A44 is built entirely of carbon fiber. Gino and Pedol’s refined and functional flair finds its full expression in the cockpit: the two side wheels leave free the passage between the large sundeck at the stern and the bridge that houses the GPS plotter and an electric winch for the sheet of the mainsail. Below deck, a large space extends all the way to the bow with a central table and face-to-face couches. And this is just the daytime configuration: at night, a sliding panel separates the dinette from the rest of the boat and turns the forward cabin into an elegant suite.