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There is no missing the fact that at 85.3 meters (280 feet) Alysia is a very large
yacht. But for her debonair Cypriot owner Andreas Liveras, she is so much more
than a pile of tastefully assembled steel, marble, silks and wool. She is a
tangible manifestation of the success of his third career and of the way this
gentleman is happiest when he is entertaining or bringing pleasure to other
people. He can now do so in a very large way.| Click on the Spec and Design tab at top to see complete list of resources. |
Liveras recently celebrated his 71st birthday, a fact that is
hard to believe for those who try vainly to keep up with his active lifestyle.
He rises before dawn and has more done by lunch than most anyone else could hope
to accomplish in an entire day. These days his work is operating the first pair
of purpose-built, SOLAS-classed charter yachts, the new Alysia and her 2004 sistership, Annaliesse. Although
Liveras has been in the yacht charter business for 20 years, these are the first
two yachts that he had a hand in designing from a blank sheet of paper, and he
speaks of them as fondly as he speaks of his granddaughters, for whom the yachts
are named. He loves the mix of classic and contemporary elements in their
interiors, such as limed-oak wall panels and sweeping marble and stainless steel
staircases with lavish Oriental silks and French provincial side chairs.
 Photograph by Stephane Bravin. (Click image to enlarge)
Liveras’ habit of rising before the sun likely remains from his youth on a
family farm in Cyprus. Even then the young man thought big. His plan was to
bring the first combine harvester to the island. He would use it to speed his
own work and then hire himself and the combine out to neighboring farms. The
harvester was formidably expensive, and to secure it, 26-year-old Liveras put up
his house as collateral. For two years things proceeded according to plan until
the day he lost control of the machine and it sped over a cliff, falling 300
feet to the sea. Liveras was luckyenough to jump off in time, but unlucky enough to have not
insured the combine.
 Nikos Dafnias of Alpha Marine created this
assertive, modern face. (Click image to enlarge)
Enter career No. 2. Liveras needed to earn money quickly to
recoup, and it wasn’t going to be in Cyprus, a place that seems to alternate
between sleepy obscurity and fractious political upheaval. He landed a job in
London with Fleur de Lys Patisseries, selling cakes from a van at 8 pounds
sterling per week. Liveras is nothing if not a good salesman. In three years he
bought the company for 2,500 pounds sterling, paying off the note in weekly
installments. Over the next 19 years, Liveras took the company from a six-man
operation in a rented basement in South Kensington to the biggest patisserie in
Europe with 1,400 employees. The secret to his success was the frozen Black
Forest Gateau. At age 50, he sold the company for $48 million and retired. His
first idea was to buy a yacht and sail around the world. Jonathan Beckett of
Nigel Burgess sold him a 27-meter Benetti named Lina III. "Retirement was the worst year of my life," laughs Liveras. "I was so bored
that I was up at five washing the boat and waking the crew." Liveras never went
around the world in Lina
III; it didn’t take long to see that he would need a
larger boat for that. Beckett was happy to oblige. "Jonathan made sure I bought
two other yachts. Then I owned a fleet, and I waived goodbye to
retirement. "The third of the three yachts was 42-meter Albacora, and Jonathan
convinced me to put it in the charter show in Antigua. Twenty-two years ago,
chartering in the Caribbean was mostly sailboats. Albacora was one of the
largest available, and we chartered her for four thousand dollars a day,"
recalls Liveras. Liveras fell in love with chartering, and the chartering
industry reciprocated. With Rosenkavalier, then Princess Tanya, Princess Lauren and
Altair,
Liveras grew into larger boats and more discriminating clientele. Although he
says he has worked harder in the last 20 years than ever before, he winks and
notes, "It’s with a nice class of people."
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