Detailed Description
The SX88 opened Sanlorenzo's crossover range and remains its most convincing and successful expression. The thinking was simple and quite radical, move the helm up to the flybridge, enclose and air-condition it, and the main deck below is suddenly free. No wheelhouse, no bulkheads, no steps, a single loft of roughly 27 metres running from an open transom to a full-width bow lounge, glazed along both sides. It is a boat that lives horizontally rather than in separated zones, and owners who have come from a conventional flybridge yacht tend to notice the difference immediately after of stepping aboard.
A DAY AT ANCHOR
This is where LA earns her keep. Electric zero-speed stabilisers work at rest as well as underway, so lunch does not have to be taken alongside and guests who are uneasy on the water stay comfortable through a swell that would otherwise send you into port. Her 1.7 metre draft is the other half of the equation, in the Balearics, the Aeolians, the Ionian or the Dalmatian coast it opens up anchorages that a deeper 27-metre simply cannot enter. The stern is designed as a beach club rather than a garage door. The swimming platform lifts and lowers itself becoming a bathing step, a tender dock or a launching cradle as required, and the aft deck opens straight onto it. A tender crane and a garage sized to 4.5 metres sit behind. An Idromar 250 l/h watermaker with active carbon filtration amongst other amentities mean a week away from a dock is a decision, not a logistics exercise.
ENTERTAINING
The flybridge is fully teaked, air conditioned, and covered by a hard top whose roof opens on electric blades, sun or shade without moving the party. It carries a bar, a custom dining sofa, a high table and loose seating for 12 guests. On the main deck the galley island doubles as a bar with six Poltrona Frau stools, the cockpit table rises and slides electrically, and the bow converts from sunpad to a second dining space. Between the three levels she will host thirty at a quayside drinks party and still feel like a private yacht for eight at dinner.
ACCOMMODATION
Eight guests in four cabins on the lower deck, a full-beam owner's suite amidships, a VIP forward, a twin to starboard and a French-bed cabin to port, each with its own bathroom. Three crew are berthed aft with their own mess, laundry and access. The interior was specified away from what is standard, silver Madras mirrors in bronze and stainless frames through the bow, salon and principal cabins, polished Calacatta Fabbricotti to the galley and island, Emperador Light marble in the owner's and VIP bathrooms, Noce Tai joinery below, and veneer boarding in place of salon carpet. The loose furniture is Minotti, Poltrona Frau and B&B Italia. Electric curtains and blackout shades throughout.
UNDER WAY
Three Volvo Penta D13 IPS3 1050 engines drive her to 23 knots and cruise at 18, with around 510 nautical miles at that speed and close to 1,000 nautical miles when throttled back, enough to move between Mediterranean cruising grounds without planning the passage around fuel. The semi-displacement hull was drawn by Lou Codega and tank-tested at Wageningen to work across the speed range rather than at one design point, which is what makes a slow passage as comfortable as a fast one. IPS with joystick control, a second station in the cockpit, Skyhook and Volvo Assisted Docking make her genuinely manageable with a small crew.
Hull number 85, completed in July 2022 and delivered to 2023 model year specification. Privately owned from new under Malta flag and showing only XXX hours. Her owner added over €1M of factory options at build and the pattern of them is telling, stabilisers, dynamic positioning, assisted docking, the lifting platform, the watermaker, the opening hard top, the teak and air-conditioned flybridge. These are the choices of someone who intended to use the boat, and they are also the options that are difficult and expensive to add later.