Storrington designer unveils £15m superyacht

A SUPERYACHT worth £15 million has been unveiled in Hong Kong by Storrington designer John Shuttleworth.

The Adastra superyacht, equipped with state-of-the-art technology and controlled remotely by an iPad, has made headlines around the world.

The masterpiece has taken five years to craft and is described by Boat International as ‘one of the world’s most amazing super yachts’.

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Speaking to the County Times from China, John said: “There was a lot of excitement at the unveiling because it’s quite a big thing for the Chinese to get a superyacht built there.

“I love the way it looks and to get a finish like that in silver is really an achievement. We’re very excited about the design, we’ve looked at it about three million times on our 3D gallery - it is really something.

“But what I’m really interested in is the fuel economy. It looks great but it’s a serious boat.”

The space-age look has been specially developed to cut through waves as it glides across the high seas.

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Adastra’s mammoth petrol tank coupled with John’s dynamic sailing efficiency design allows her to travel up to 4,000 miles without refuelling.

The monster 77 tonne petrol capacity would cost around £42,000 to refuel at a Sussex pump.

But this is a small price to pay for new owner billionaire shipping magnate Anto Marden.Uses for the yacht will include transport between two tropical island he owns off the coast of Indonesia.

The 65-year-old designer continued: “It was close to his [Anto’s] home so he was heavily involved with the process, visiting the boat a lot.

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“It was always going to have accommodation but then his wife got involved and made us up our game in terms of getting the interior amazing.”

The integrated ship monitoring system allows you to control everything onboard from an iPad at a 50 metre range.

“It’s a Florida company which has come up with writing an app for the yacht,” said John. “When they first come across and showed us I thought ‘that’s a bit of fun’, but it’s a serious high-tech piece of equipment. You can control everything on the yacht from the iPad, including steering.”

The floating palace has been compared by national newspapers to Roman Abramovich’s superyacht.

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John added he ‘never thought it would be looked at like that but it’s all a bit of fun’.

The Storrington designer will return home soon within the coming weeks and says he will monitor Adastra’s sea trials in a bid to make the superyacht even more fuel efficient.

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