No business can thrive without an injection of new blood, the superyacht business included. Olivier Dorrell and Peter Symonds, two twenty-something designers, certainly believe it. They launched Vienna-based Totti Design in January of this year with the philosophy that megayacht owners who build fully custom yachts deserve fully custom tenders.

Dorrell and Symonds have degrees in automotive design, an achievement they share with some of today's leading yacht designers, including Glade Johnson. Consider also that some of their car designs have received professional accolades, with Symonds receiving an award for Best Interior by ADI (Italian Industrial Design Association) at the Stile Giovanni Design Competition in 2006 and Dorrell being a finalist in the 2004 World Automotive Design Competition.

Though the partners are positioning themselves as designers of custom tenders, they're also meeting with clients who simply want a smaller (20- to 40-foot) primary boat. Dorrell says they have met with brokers and shipyard representatives and alternately shown their own concepts as well as incorporated ideas an owner requested.

One such concept is the Magneto 25, pictured above. The color and the shape combine for a bold, modern statement. It's easy to imagine something like this accompanying an equally bold, aggressively styled yacht. Dorrell says it can be built of fiberglass or carbon fiber.

For a more traditional approach, check out the classic cruiser seen here. Built by PEurope in Hungary, the all-wood beauty still employs the latest technology for performance, but she additionally embraces the design elements that made Rivas and other mahogany runabouts the stuff of many a yachtsman's dream.

Thought it's a tough time to be launching a new business, Dorrell and Symonds seem determined to succeed. I look forward to seeing more come from their studio.

Recently I told you how the New Zealand-based company Urban Voyage is helping owners better understand the technical and aesthetic features of their yachts. By taking the engineering and interior-design drawings and combining them into one file that's Web-accessible by everyone involved in the project, Urban Voyage is also helping the various parties better communicate changes they'd like to see and have questions addressed.

Now the company has released a new software system that furthers these benefits, though it can be used by builders and designers as early as the marketing stage, when they're trying to attract clients. Called YachtVIEU, it's an interactive, 3D presentation--and all it requires to use is Adobe Acrobat, which every computer already has.

New Zealand Yachts and Lazzara Yachts are among the megayacht builders using YachtVIEU. In a nutshell, the program lets users manipulate the image to see the yacht's shapes from any angle, and even "fly" up close to inspect deck layouts and interior arrangements. There's also the ability to view step-by-step construction processes. All of this is shown in animation, which makes the learning process more enjoyable. In addition, Urban Voyage makes the YachtVIEU documents available as 10- to 20-MB downloadable files or a maximum of 5-MB files so that they can be e-mailed.

To get a better idea of how the specifics work, click here. The demo is for a 163-foot wavepiercer, pictured above, by New Zealand Yachts. You can hit the Play button and let the demo automatically take you through various views, and you can even watch as the colors of the sundeck furnishings change. Or, you can move the image around as you wish, seeing cross-sections of the decks. I did both, and they're equally remarkable. YachtVIEU goes a long way toward making the design and build process smoother for all.

If you've chartered a yacht, no doubt you've been treated to some stunning table settings. Stews pride themselves on decorating dining tables to look festive whenever the chance arises, and some of them are not only inventive, but also quite artistic. So, why not sponsor a competition to let them exercise their creativity?

That's what Lisa Ferry and JoAnne Lockhart of Yacht Next thought. Ferry and Lockhart, whose company specializes in yacht interior outfitting and design, created the Perfect Setting Tabletop Challenge 2008, held in conjunction with the recent Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show. The charter experts at The Sacks Group as well as other companies sponsored the competition.

Two categories were presented for yacht crews to participate in, and they were able to enter just one or both: A Formal Evening Afloat and Neptune--God of the Seas. As the name implies, the formal category was intended for stews to showcase lavish, somewhat more traditional presentations, with the centerpiece to be a real showpiece; music would help earn extra points, too. This was a strictly interior-dining setting. As for the Neptune category, here's where the fun factor kicked in. Crewmembers were encouraged to go over the top with accessories "to best lure your guests to a mythical, magical feast 'fit for the Gods,'" as the entry form explained. This was to be an external-dining area setting.

The winners:

A FORMAL EVENING AFLOAT:

1st Prize: stewardess Anick Cliche of Sea Fox (see her lovely setting above)

2nd Prize: stewardesses Coty, Haley and Sara of Paramour

3rd Prize: stewardess Reneta Dimitrova of Pure Bliss

NEPTUNE--GOD OF THE SEA:

1st Prize: stewardess Lani Erediano of Beeliever (see the colorful tabletop above)

2nd Prize: stewardesses Lauren Steyn and Rene Mainstone of Touch

3rd Prize: stewardess Reneta Dimitrova of Pure Bliss

GRAND PRIZE WINNER:

stewardess Lani Erediano of Beeliever (see the impressive tabletop above)

Due to the success of the competition, the Perfect Setting Tabletop Challenge is to become an annual event.

photos: Suki Finnerty

I cannot stop laughing at this great video created by Capt. Carl Sputh and the crew of Starfire (above). It stars "Safety Man," who can sense when yachties are doing something dangerous, then flies to help set them straight in the nick of time. (Being a red-blooded male, he also likes pretty stewardesses, as you'll see.)

I knew this megayacht crew was a creative bunch, but boy, this takes the cake.