Blur & Kelt Cognac Yacht Design Challenge

Maybe your yacht design isn’t well known… but it can be known by the best!

I’ve presented a number of cool sailing boats during the last two years. Many of them qualified as being ”sweet” (all articles + sweetest 2007). There is no exact definition of what sweet really means, but most racing sailors know a sweet boat when they see one! It just looks right. Fast and fun even at the dock, and you would love to take it out sailing. It could be a small and elegant daysailer, a perfect racer/cruiser or a carbon beast that will make the crew scream when speed records are broken.

We also know that there are many great designs that, for various reasons, will never be built and sailed. Both from amateurs, rising stars as well as established designers. It would be a shame if those designs just ended up in your drawer or a forgotten folder on your computer?

So let us see them!!!

Just for fun. Or to get some attention. Or to win a bottle of the extraordinary ocean matured Kelt Cognac X.O. – the obvious choice on a classic Fife, 12-metre or superyacht, but also for that special moment at the designer’s office…

900 miles from Cognac to LeHavre. 25000 miles at sea around the world and then back to Cognac. While still in oak barrels, our Grande Champagne cognac travels around the world at sea. Through the Mediterranean via the Suez canal to Colombo, Singapore, Hong Kong, Pusan, Keelung and Tokyo. Then on to Los Angeles and via Panama into the Mexican gulf stopping at Charleston, Baltimore, and then New York before crossing the Atlantic back to France and Cognac for a well-earned rest before bottling. All this to bring you the ultimate cognac experience. The Ocean Maturation, (or Tour du Monde in French), creates a legendary roundness and smootness that characterise all KELT cognacs.

Vision X3M is one of the designs that will enter the competition. A 30′ speedster with a swing keel driven by a Harken pedestal. Sweet!

The rules are simple:

1. Competing designs (this time) should be monohulls, 20 to 45 feet
2. Send an email (peter@blur.se) with drawings, sketches, dimensions and a short description of the boat. Anything that will help people to understand the concept. Also, give the design a cool name!
3. We’ll present the boats individually on the blog from now until February 28th 2009. Readers will be able to comment and ask questions and the designer may answer and make clarifications. This is supposed to be a fun dialogue for everyone.
4. In March 2009 our readers will vote on which design is the “sweetest”, and a bottle of Kelt X.O. Cognac will be awarded to the winner. Additional prizes may be set up along the way, as well as a special jury prize.
5. The competition is open to everyone, and competitors retain all rights to their designs and all material sent in. We reserve the right to use the material to promote the competition itself.
6. If a design is realized, I should be invited to the sea trial :-)