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[ CREATIVE MINDS:
JARON GINTON ]
THE ART OF SIMPLICITY by Mark Worden
Above: a rendering of the 44.7 metre Falcon 122, which is currently being built at the Falcon shipyard in Pisa in Italy. Right: Jaron Ginton in his studio in Haarlem in the Netherlands. He was born and raised in Israel and served as a captain in the country’s navy
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“Keep it simple” is something of a mantra these days, but it has been the design philosophy of Jaron Ginton ever since he set up Ginton Naval Architects in 2002. His other key words are seaworthiness and practicality, which always come ahead of being stylish. And these qualities are proving to be a winning combination at a time of uncertainty for the market
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[ CREATIVE MINDS ]
M
uch to my surprise, the market is still booming, at least that’s what I’m experiencing, and I think it’s true for other people as well. And it doesn’t seem logical: first, there was the Covid pandemic, and
then the war in Ukraine, which led to the collapse of both the Russian and Ukrainian markets, but other markets seem to have taken their place.” Life is good for Jaron Ginton, the Israeli-born, Netherlands-based designer, whose resumé included stints as a captain, first in the Israeli Navy, and then on charter boats, prior to studying naval architecture at the Higher Institute of Technology in Haarlem. He co-founded Ginton & Weber in 1992, prior to setting up Ginton Naval Architects in 2002. Since then, he has designed over 100 boats. These days he’s doing a lot of work with Turkish shipyards, while the Dutch yard Van der Valk is another regular. Italy is also picking up and that is where he is working on the Falcon 122, a 44.7 metre, which is currently being built at the Falcon Yachts shipyard in Pisa, in Tuscany, and which should be ready for launch “in 2025, possibly 2024.” The interior designer is also Italian: Hot Lab in Milan, “with whom we’ve done two other projects.” The client, who “lives on the other side of the Ocean”, wanted “less than 500 gross tonnage, in order to have commercial registration and unrestricted navigation.” He’s also interested in “chartering heavily.” The brief was for a steel hull and aluminium superstructure. Ginton says: “She won’t be fast, we expect her do about 15.5 knots.” She will be powered by two caterpillar engines, with 1312 horsepower, while the fuel capacity will be 45,000 litres. Building work began in January of this year. Ginton describes the client’s requirements as being “pretty conventional, with four guest cabins. The master cabin is on the upper deck aft. The owner will have his own deck, with a cabin and behind that his own saloon, the master saloon. The captain will be in the bow of the main deck, in the front close to the tender garage, so not adjacent to the wheelhouse but not too far it. The crew will have separate stairs, which is normal for a boat of this kind, so that they can go from their accommodation down below up to the wheelhouse without using the owner’s stairs.” There will be 11 crew, including the captain. The owner “really likes whirlpools and so we have two, one in the bow and one on the sun deck.” Other features include “a garage in the bow for the rescue boat and the big tender, with a sliding crane. The garage itself will have two hydraulic doors that open up and you can use the sliding crane in order to launch the speed boat.” The main design challenge came in the form of the ceilings “as the owner is very tall.” When it comes to designing a boat, Ginton says that he and the other
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A rendering of the Falcon 122 as seen from the port side. Note the whirlpool, which is one of two on board. In addition to providing pleasure to the owner and his family over the years, there is also a strong focus on chartering
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[ CREATIVE MINDS ]
Two renderings of the Falcon 122 from the starboard side. For Jaron Ginton, the biggest challenge in this project was keeping to within the 500-tonnage requirement, while having to build ceilings that were high enough for “the very tall owner”
architects who work with him “Listen to the client and see what he likes,
solution. Simplicity requires a lot of effort!” And making sure that yachts
but we have to like it, too, otherwise we can’t put it on paper!” But whatever
are seaworthy always comes ahead of trying to make them look good: “For
the client’s requests, his two guiding principles are seaworthiness and
us, styling will never win over seaworthiness and practicality. And so, if
simplicity, although the latter can be surprisingly complicated: “Maybe we
somebody wants a boat that is only beautiful and not practical, then they
have to draw something four or five times before we find a good simple
should go to another designer!”
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