Lady Moura: On board the 105m Blohm+Voss superyacht
At the age of 30, Lady Moura is maturing with impressive grace. Now under new ownership, we remember one of the biggest brokerage sales of 2021...
Whatever Lady Moura's been taking, I'd like some. She may be 31 years old, a respectable age for a yacht, but the palatial interior of this seven-deck, 105 metre looks as pristine as the day Blohm+Voss launched her to international fanfare in 1990 - and she's just found a new owner.
With exteriors and interiors by Luigi Sturchio, she was then the ninth largest yacht ever built – and the most expensive. Three decades of ultra-private family use followed before she made her public debut on the brokerage market in 2019. As of June 2021, she is under new ownership after just two short years on the market and was asking a cool $125,000,000.
Her (original) carpets are still soft, pure cream; flowers tumble from vases on to freshly polished dressers. "One of the things that we're most proud of, actually," says relief captain Sebastian Rauber, "is that most of the interior is still original." One beauty secret here is constant maintenance by an army of crew who know every corner of the boat. "The average time crew have been on board is 18 years: the chief housekeeper has been here for 25 years; the bosun 28 years; the chief engineer came on board the first time in 1993; the captain has been here for 17 years. A lot of people have spent more time on this boat than at home over the last 20 years."
The second secret of youth is use – or the lack of it. She's never been chartered; in fact she hasn't moved much at all. To those familiar with Port Hercules, Lady Moura is as distinctive a feature as the Foster + Partners-designed Yacht Club – and she pre-dates that by 24 years. "Cruising – we didn't do too much," says Captain Matthias Bosse. There are 13,500 running hours on the clock – that averages out at around 37.5 a month.
The third factor is the bone structure that Blohm+Voss installed. "Lady Moura was built in one of the most important shipyards in the world," says Paolo Casani, CEO of Camper & Nicholsons.
"She was built by a passionate owner who participated very much and influenced the shipyard with some solutions. So over five years of construction plus one year for engineering – there were in total six years planning and construction, which means that they had time to take care of every little detail. This is one of the reasons why the boat, after 30 years, is still in very good condition."
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