Princess Flies Into Space Age

Darth Vader’s battleship? Stealth Bomber of the seas? The dark, ‘midnight blue’ colour of the first Princess X95 and the model’s aggressive profile have already polarised opinions. However, this semi-custom ‘nautical SUV’ is not about shock tactics but of enormous living spaces, flexible layouts and personal visions, all starting with one man’s light bulb moment while visiting Asia.

- John Higginson 

Don’t call it black. It’s Princess’s own Midnight Blue. And don’t assume the next X95 hulls coming out of the Plymouth builder’s historic South Yard will be the same colour. The X95 scheduled for delivery to Hong Kong in early 2021 has a white hull, as do the units set to launch before and after it, with any spraying done post production.

As images and footage of the first X Class ‘Super Flybridge’ yacht off England’s south coast circulate around the world, opinions are divided, colourful and passionate, especially online, where the model’s global launch was held on Facebook Live this summer.

The yacht’s dark paint scheme looks to have intensified first impressions of a polarising model whose high-volume design, aggressive profile and top-heavy appearance marks a dramatic change for Princess, although the customary elegant lines remain, albeit in different places.

In the desire to radically increase space and volume in a 95ft yacht, Princess has created a super-long flybridge or ‘superfly’ that has led to “fairly dramatic styling, which isn’t for everybody”, admits Will Green, Princess’s Director of Sales, who has been with the company since 2003.

But as the X95 divides, it also conquers. Nine sales to the US, Europe and Asia had been secured by late July’s online launch, which was held while the owners of hull one – long-time Princess clients – were away enjoying their new yacht, a model that’s classified as a pleasure vessel due to its sub-24m load line.

It’s a remarkable pre-launch sales figure considering the size of the yacht, Covid-19 challenges and the fact hardly anyone had been able to view an X95 outside of the hull one owners’ family and those involved with making the yacht.

“Selling nine at this stage is quite a statement,” Green admits.