There are those who believe that a boat should look like a boat, making more of nautical tradition than a token gesture. Others say the matter is ripe for interpretation. The modern, tasteful and understated 51.7-meter (170-foot) Red Dragon, impeccably built by Alloy Yachts of New Zealand, exemplifies both perspectives.

On one hand, she’s from the design office of Dubois Naval Architects, the latest in a line of 52-meter luxury sloops that began with Tiara and will continue with Mondango. Each encompasses progressive design with proven performance and is a refinement of the one before it.

Like all well-designed boats, Red Dragon’s aesthetic proportions are just right. She is softer and sleeker than her predecessor, and she sits on the water like a dream. Her owners stepped away from convention when, having selected a highly experienced combination of naval architects and builders, they opted for a complete newcomer to marine design to look after her interior styling. A French firm, Wilmotte & Associates, known as industrial designers and architects of museums, galleries and offices, was appointed to bring fresh thinking and new ideas to its first ever marine interior.

Even before going aboard, you will recognize that Red Dragon is a high-caliber vessel. Her lines are well proportioned. She is big, but her substantial topsides and superstructure don’t look as immense as they obviously are, which can only be attributed to Dubois draftsmanship. Yet you could be in a gallery, a hotel or a holiday home. In fact, you could be almost anywhere other than aboard a boat.

Her exterior features stainless and glass in great quantities, but it is completely absent of timber, saving an estimated six weeks of varnishing each year. And the wraparound coachroof (common on motorboats and a welcome new feature where an impression of light and space are required aboard a sailboat) is sleek and industrially modern. The detail, which includes a Chinese inscription, is certainly not nautical, and thanks to cleverly concealed utilities, both her forward and aft decks are devoid of almost any visible function except providing acres of space.

But the interior is probably where the fussier purists, expecting a boat to look like a boat, will most struggle with this beautifully thought out and constructed vessel. To understand why the boat is the way she is, these critics will have to appreciate the owners and their story.

Owner Guy Ullens is a Belgian industrialist and philanthropist whose father and uncle were both senior diplomats in China. In 2007, Ullens and his wife Myriam opened the Ullens Centre of Contemporary Art in Beijing, which is one of the world’s largest private collections of contemporary Chinese art. They commissioned Wilmotte & Associates to design the facility and selected the firm to work with them on the interior of Red Dragon.

Red Dragon goes to weather. (Click image to enlarge)

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The interior styling seems of particular importance to the owners, who planned to spend a quarter of each year on board and wanted something that was contemporary and bright. Much of the lightness is achieved through the selection of pale wood, a color chosen to match as closely as possible a piece of driftwood that Myriam found while walking on the beach in Antigua. This color became the foundation for the interior. Lightness is also achieved through careful selection and placement of furnishings and fittings.

If you judge by the owners’ taste in art, they are given much more to simplicity and relaxed style than to extravagance. In fact, the interior could almost be considered clinical, except that textures and the inclusion of artwork, sometimes ethnic and sometimes modern, inject it with life. In the main salon, wood cabinetry with a "corrugated" textured finish sits next to smooth veneer storage units atop pale tongue-and-groove floors. White linen couches are adorned with cushions in warm reds and oranges. The furniture appears to be suspended in space, an effect created by clever lighting and cantilevering units off the walls. Surfaces are clean, smooth and likely very practical for life at sea.

A walk-through takes you from your choice of entry points: an extending passerelle, double articulating stern-boarding platform or hydraulic side-boarding stairway on the starboard side. Guests then cross an extensive aft deck that is clear of all but very few items of deck hardware and has ample room for the boat’s stock of freestanding Paola Lenti loungers.

The aft cockpit is down two steps and features alfresco dining for 10 and a lounging area. It is protected by the flybridge overhang and sides that can be open or closed to the weather.

Alloy Yachts’ sliding stainless steel and glass doors admit you into the main salon, which features a grand central staircase in the center to carry guests from the forward end of the salon to the guest accommodations on the lower deck. The stairway divides the main deck into distinct areas: formal lounge, bar and dining area.

The generously sized accommodations consist of a full-beam owner’s suite with large bathroom and freestanding bathtub, three guest suites and a gymnasium. The gym is equipped with a Pullman berth, in case an extra bed is required.

The wheelhouse sits on the main deck forward of two automatic sliding doors set into the forward bulkhead. Through the companionway are the captain’s double ensuite cabin and a fully equipped laundry. Down a level, the companionway opens into a large galley, the crew mess to port (equipped with ship’s monitors and alarms), four crew cabins and the engine room.

The flybridge, accessed via the aft cockpit, hosts twin helm stations, each equipped with engine and thruster controls and sail controls positioned on a central panel. An area for recreation, in the form of a sunbathing deck, two L-shaped bench settees and low coffee tables, serviced by a bar, is positioned behind the helm area.While aesthetically Red Dragon is a step apart from previous launches Kokomo and Tiara, the boat as a sailing vessel is an ongoing refinement of designs currently on the water. The line’s hull designs are the same, but the layouts and space planning are done to different client briefs, which means changes in structural arrangements between designs.

McKeon says that Red Dragon has finer forward sections and a broader aft beam than the others, which improves her reaching ability. Like all Dubois boats, she was tank-tested to confirm engine power and sailing performance, and to optimize keel and rudder design. While new boats that are truly geared toward sailing performance often are made of carbon-fiber composite, she is constructed from aluminum, which proved good enough for Tiara and Drumbeat (ex-Salperton) to win their classes on corrected time in last year’s transatlantic race.

"We think the boat has all of the comforts with a good turn of performance," McKeon explains.

Racing has changed the way luxury boats are designed, he says. "Ten years ago, these boats didn’t do regattas, but now their owners want to win, so they are investing in high-tech sails and carbon rigging and putting more and more sail area onto the boat, features that don’t compromise comfort. There is no downside to it, and Dubois has always done this successfully."

Like the boat, the rig and sails are also New Zealand-made. The rig is a carbon-fiber five-spreader mast with a furling boom from Marten Spars. The sails, with a total area of approximately 2,500 square meters, are Stratis by Doyle Sailmakers.

"Only half a dozen yards can build this type of sailing boat to this level," McKeon says of Alloy Yachts and Dubois’ preference for New Zealand workmanship. "Even though the exchange rate doesn’t make coming to New Zealand cheaper anymore, the product is excellent."

Of the owner’s decision to create an interior that is a world apart from tradition, McKeon predicts a new trend emerging: "We’ll be seeing more and more of this. It’s always nice to have fresh ideas, and boat design is increasingly about the architectural experience, whereas in the old days it was about the sailing of the yacht."