Perini Navi, the world wide leader in designing and building large luxury sailboats, presented last may in Porto Rotondo, Sardinia, the 56 metres cutter Salute, it is the shipyard’s latest unit of the 56 meters series, that has as predecessors the acclaimeds Burrasca, Santa Maria, Rosehearty and Selene.

Beyond having the essential characteristics of the 56 metres series of the Italian shipyard, but with an architecture that has been optimised by the shipyard and Ron Holland to obtain a better sailing performance, Salute presents a singularity that makes it radically different from the previous ones: it is rigged with a single mast, that its 75 metres height and is built in aluminium, turning it into the tallest mast made in this material.

EXCEPTIONAL RIG
Mast Division, according with the latest weight optimisation trends for masts. This internal department of Perini, that is highly specialised, developed a new design for masts and backstays using finite element analysis software to obtain the lightest possible structures without compromising the security. In fact, in collaboration with the naval architecture department and marine engineering of the university of Genoa, Perini has developed special sensors, similar to the ones used on the America’s Cup boats, to follow and to control the loads on shrouds and stays, sensors that on the day we made sea trials on board the new sailboat were being used to control the behaviour of the rig within the sailing conditions at that moment, with a wind speed of 16 knots and main plus reacher or genoa and staysail.
The large sail area of the main for a mast of the size as the one that Salute exhibits took the mentioned masts division at Perini to create also a special winch for its halyard, a captive giga-winch, with two power drums and a third one for storage. For the rest, in Ron Holland own words, “to optimise the performance of the powerful sail area rigged as a cutter, with its 2.900 square meters of sail area, the keel - folding as in all the Perini - and the lines of the rudder were modified to improve the stability in accordance with the high centre of gravity that the mast produces”. It is important to stand out that the mast of Salute is the second world highest after the one of Mirabella V.

















PECULIAR DECK
The disposition of the deck also turns Salute into a unique sailboat. The owner required a different layout of the outer spaces that would favour socialisation, therefore, inspired by the 52 metres ketch Liberty, the fore deck is equipped with a real 60 square meters covered saloon, at a lower level than the rest of the deck and surrounding the mast base, that is added to the traditional stern saloon so characteristic of Perini. This semicircular space, provided with sofas and tables, is acceded from the lateral walkways going down a few steps and is protected from the elements by a waterproof canvas as a marquee that converges at the mast base itself acting as an awning stanchion. The whole area is flanked by circular transparent that allow a 180º vision. Both the canvas as the windows can be taken off at will, based on the use wanted to be given to this space, whether in port or in navigation.

LUXURY MINIMALISM
The interiors of Salute are a work of the Parisian interior designer Rémi Tessier, who got the order of the owners, a young couple with children, to create familiar, pure and natural atmospheres, but having a certain Japanese style inspiration. Therefore the election of the materials: ceiling light in whitened sycamore with also whitened and listed fir strips, a wood also used on the sides of the saloon, teak surface with ebony insertions, combinations of stainless steel ebony and leather on the tables, leather braided panels for the cabins, combined once again with the mentioned hard woods and clear leather, composites on the surfaces of the bathrooms with nickel-plated metal insertions and teak surface … All this contributes to create calm and relaxed interiors, in which the incidence of the light has been brilliantly studied so that it does not interrupt the fluidity and the purity of the lines with great chiaroscuro nor alters the predominant natural tones with aggressive contrasts.