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Most people just assume that any gadget works, especially at sea where it sort of has to
work. If things were otherwise, yacht owners would simply condemn the things to
walk the proverbial plank. Beyond achieving basic functionality, the real
challenge for engineers and yacht designers today is to make any kind of
automation truly elegant, for an experience as sleek, user-friendly and
beautifully designed as the vessel itself. Call it the iPod Epoch of the Digital
Age—the new universal standard for intuitive ease and pleasing design.
An iPodish remote control from Denmark’s Lantic Systems, for
example, really feels good in hand—solid, round and perfectly smooth like a
skipping stone with just the right heft and shape for curling your forefinger
neatly around. Affectionately called the Lantic "puck," you just can’t help
fiddling with it like some sort of Rubik’s Cube, while alternately issuing
rapid-fire commands: "Raise curtains and lights for the sunrise scenario," "Find
and play Yo-Yo Ma’s Bach cello suites in reverse order," "Surf the Net for
restaurants in Monte-Carlo before we dock in twenty minutes."
 Making the very complex very simple—and elegant: a Lantic puck" controller (above) and a Crestron touch
panel, shown here. (Click image to enlarge)
Once this has been accomplished, imagine stepping into the
shower. Turning on the spray, you hear a gentle knock. A steward arrives with
the espresso you’ve requested. What to do? Well, thanks to a high-tech glass
called Priva-Lite, you simply touch a button and the glass fogs up, instantly
becoming opaque and saving you from embarrassment. Then from the bathroom mirror
appears a TV screen. You can catch CNBC without having to hustle back dripping
wet to the stateroom. If you were aboard Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s
301-foot Tatoosh, to dry off you could plant yourself before a roaring
French limestone fireplace. Is it dangerous? Not at all because glass doors will
automatically seal off those dancing, licking flames if and when the boat
rolls.
Winning Lloyd’s seal of approval was a challenge, recalls
Tatoosh’s interior designer, Thomas Achille, of Los Angeles- and Las
Vegas-based Achille Associates International. In a way, now-eight-year-old
Tatoosh was the perfect vessel on which to demonstrate the luxury and
comfort of push-button living. Her original owner, mobile phone magnate Craig
McCaw, possessed the wherewithal and the savvy to employ all the known genies of
automation, setting the standard for yachts in the coming millennium.
The Lantic puck is allegedly more
fun—and easier—than a Rubik’s Cube. (Click images to enlarge)
For a prime example of how a great gadget can improve a yacht
owner’s life, consider the little remote on the night table of Tatoosh’s
master suite. It controls the matchstick shades across the windows, as well as
the silk blackout shades that create three different compartments out of the
yacht’s vast, full-beam space. You can work late while your partner sleeps. But,
says Achille, "it would have been totally impractical to do [this] manually." In
other words, he would have had to divide up the master with walls—an entirely
different proposition.
What gadgets might Achille install on the next Tatoosh?
"I like automatic closets," he says. "You have these racks and
rails with the dry cleaning in them, where you can punch in the outfit you want
for the afternoon right on your computer. Enter D-39 and up comes the pink suit,
purple scarf and red shoes.
"PrivaGlass is something we are doing in homes that’s perfect
for yachts; shower enclosures, skylights—anywhere you sometimes need
privacy—especially if you don’t want any kind of window covering, shades or
curtains."
 Paul Allen’s gadget-filled
Tatoosh
includes an automated
fireplace. Photograph by Dana Jinkins. (Click image to enlarge)
Marco Struik of Struik & Hamerslag Yacht Interiors and
Refits in the Netherlands heads up interior production for such floating marvels
as Lady in Blue, Lady Christina, Mirabella V and others. He agrees
with Achille that Priva-Lite glass offers brilliant design enrichments with its
ability to change magically from opaque to translucent.
"On Trinity’s 144-foot Marlena," says Struik, "we would
have had a labyrinth situation if this glass didn’t exist. The galley would have
had to have been totally separated from the dining room."
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