Late designer Giorgio Armani's $60 million superyacht could be considered the epitome of excess, down to every last outrageous, sun-defying detail.
Maìn, the 213-foot extravagant "super-palace" yacht built in 2008, features six cabins, a cinema, a spa pool, an indoor gym, and a spacious sundeck, all furnished with custom designs, according to Luxurylaunches. Having a sundeck at all may come as a shock, considering that the superyacht's shutters were reportedly specialized to accommodate Armani's distaste for the sun.
Luxurylaunches reported that the crew was trained to shadow the yacht owner and constantly adjust the blinds so that "no distracting glare would ever reach the late billionaire designer's eyes." A yacht so strict in structure even the light was expected to obey. The shutters reportedly inspired similar panels at the Armani Hotel in Milan, further solidifying his reputedly disciplined aesthetic in all facets of his life, including architecture.
The article described Armani's musings on typical chartered yachts, as told to Architectural Digest, as "too white, too much lighting, too much marble and crystal." To counter typical boat interiors apt to be bright from sun exposure, Maìn was designed to be the exact opposite, even going so far as to mitigate open-water glare.
"He treated light as another material to be sculpted, no less important than fabric on a runway," the Luxurylaunches writer, Sayan Chakravarty, wrote.
While superyachts and megayachts are symbols of status and wealth, these A-list toys come at a huge environmental cost. Between the amounts of diesel they require to operate and the pollution they leave in their wake, the effects are catastrophic. The Guardian stated that megayachts are environmentally indefensible and owning one is the most polluting activity a single person can possibly engage in.
In fact, a European yacht owner emits as much carbon in one year as an average person would over 585 years, according to Oxfam. To make the disparity more alarming, the irresponsible pollution created by the ultra-rich affects lower-income families and vulnerable communities more than others, as they experience a disproportionate share of the repercussions of extreme weather and public health concerns directly related to rising global temperatures.
Thankfully, companies such as Silent Yachts are striving to make luxury yachting more sustainable, specializing in solar-powered vessels. There's still a long way to go before it becomes mainstream, but eco-friendly options featuring alternative energy sources are on the rise and could mitigate the damage that's more massive than the fuel-chugging yachts themselves.
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