Speed, comfort and aesthetics

Giovanni Tamburi is chairman and president of Tamburi Investment Partners (TIP SpA), a corporate finance and investment institution founded in 1999 by Tamburi and listed on the Milan Stock Exchange. He is also owner of Xnoi (pronounced ‘per noi’ in Italian, meaning ‘for us’), a 30m sloop with naval architecture, exterior and interior design by Nauta Yachts. Indiana Yachting built the carbon pre-preg hull and deckhouse, but the yacht was finished and fitted out by the Picchiotti yard in La Spezia. Although not a pure Perini, there is some reason to suppose that the all-carbon Xnoi is an indication that the brand will build a carbon boat of its own in the near future, as owner’s look for more speed on the Bucket circuit.



“Yes, we are pursuing the opportunity to build full carbon fibre and preparing the infrastructure to respond to that need, but the hulls would not be built in-house,” said Burak Akgul, Perini’s managing director of sales, marketing & design, during the Perini Navi Cup last September.

TSO sailed aboard Xnoi on the second day of the Perini Navi Cup, although the race was eventually cancelled when a succession of squalls, gusting up to 50 knots, swept along the north-east coast of Sardinia bringing torrential rain, thunder and lightening. We took advantage of the bad weather to talk with her owner below deck in the yacht’s spacious split-level saloon.

“I was looking for a high-performance blue water cruiser, a fast boat but also a comfortable one,” he began. “Mario Pedol of Nauta Yachts designed my previous yacht, a Nauta 70, which was the flagship model when they were still building their own yachts. I was very happy with that boat, but having a family of five meant I needed more space and also more light on board. I’m not really a fan of modern shapes and plumb bows, so I asked for lines reminiscent of yachts in the 1990s with skylights that allow more light into the raised saloon.”

Pedol worked with the owner to design a yacht that in terms of exterior and interior styling is subtly contemporary instead of aggressively avant-garde. The dark grey metallic paintwork, for example, matches the matt-finished titanium deck hardware, while the split-level saloon provides the charm of a traditional deckhouse with the tighter radii and crisp décor of a modern interior. The evergreen design is also ideal for a chartering, an important consideration for the owner from the start.

Tamburi was attending the Perini Navi Cup not so much to compete on the racecourse, as to enjoy the end-of-season opportunity it provides like-minded owners to relax during a family event hosted by the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda, of which he is a member. He prefers to use his boat for fast cruising in the Mediterranean and the Greek islands are a favourite destination (last year he spent some time aboard 45m Aslec 4, owned by friend and business associate Cesare d’Amico, who was interviewed in Issue 2 of TSO). So if he’s not into pure racing, why the decision to build a high-performance, composite boat?



“The main reason was because I wanted a light boat,” he responded. “When you’re sailing a carbon hull the feeling is that you’re skimming across the top of the waves, rather than pushing through the water. It’s a totally different sensation. But there was an additional motive: my company is one of the biggest investors in technology in Italy, so it made perfect sense for me to build a boat out of high-tech materials.”

Tamburi briefly considered taking over the 38m aluminium hull – sister ship to the racer-cruiser P2 – already in build at Picchiotti, but he points out that the extra length was surplus to his requirements and would have involved increased initial cost, insurance, extra crew and berthing fees.

“I think Xnoi must be one of the fastest and most spacious 30m sailing yachts in the world,” he concluded. “For me it is the optimum compromise between speed, comfort and aesthetics.”

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