The Jacques Yves chairs are born from Poltrona Frau and Studio Zuccon

Poltrona Frau is increasingly active in the yachting sector. The collaboration between Poltrona Frau’s Custom Interiors division and the famous Rome-based design firm Zuccon International Project has created Jacques-Yves, a modular and customisable seating system with a wide range of components.

“The explosion of the Covid-19 pandemic has undoubtedly sharpened our focus on this business,” explained Poltrona Frau CEO Nicola Coropulis, “because boats, and yachts in particular, are seen as private islands guaranteeing their owners not only comfort but also safety. That is why we have been developing products specifically for the yachting world with Zuccon International Project in Rome, adding value to our offering”.

The partnership between the Poltrona Frau division and the Rome-based firm headed by Bernardo Zuccon and his sister Martina is based above all on the fact that they share the same purposes and capabilities, on their capacity to form long-term relationships with their customers and help them develop their ideas, and on their desire to associate their vision and identity with the client’s culture and values. The results will not be limited to the aesthetic sphere but will address all the yachting sector’s complexity in terms of construction and use.

“Thanks to the work of Zuccon International Project, a highly valued partner of our important client Sanlorenzo,” continued Nicola Coropulis, “we intend to establish an even more solid relationship with the client and offer the market an innovative product specifically designed for the superyacht segment”.

With the same spirit of enthusiasm, Bernardo Zuccon, who with his sister Martina heads Zuccon International Project, commented: “Designing a sofa for the yachting market was both an unusual and a fascinating challenge, above all because of this partnership with Poltrona Frau, an internationally renowned company with which I am happy to embark on what will hopefully become a long-term collaboration. In approaching this project, I tried to identify the primary need that the object would be required to satisfy, because in the words of the famous Charles Eames, “recognizing the need is the primary condition for design”. The real turning point in approaching a project so different from those I am used to was applying all my baggage of experience in the world of yachts to designing a sofa that really does solve the problems raised by its unusual location: an environment that moves on water”.

The Jacques-Yves seating system

The first result of the synergy between Poltrona Frau Custom Interiors and Zuccon International Projects is the Jacques-Yves seating system for both indoor and outdoor use. It is a versatile and flexible system, not only in terms of its composition and the wide variety of finishes available, but also of its use across the home, yacht and hospitality sectors. Its timeless, understated and essential design interacts harmoniously with any ambience, however sumptuous or minimalist, appealing to a niche market that is multicultural and heterogeneous.

The sofas feature boxy lines with a horizontal sweep. Their volumes are generous but contained within compact dimensions, designed to limit the space they occupy, one of the main design constraints in the yachting industry. Elements like armrests and seat depth are reduced to a minimum without compromising comfort and harmony of form. Storage is always a precious resource on a boat and so compartments of the same size as the sofa are built into the seats, a totally new feature in this sector, demonstrating Poltrona Frau’s ability to draw on many years’ experience manufacturing upholstered furniture and to transfer know-how and product research between its three divisions.

“I employed the principle of illusion in approaching this project,” added Bernardo Zuccon, “and this enabled us to produce an object that on first sight might seem best suited to the home, because of its lines, style and lightness, but which in fact has all the functions more typical of traditional marine furniture”.

The system offers a very wide range of components and a modularity that provides maximum flexibility and unexpected configuration versatility, adapting easily to boats of different types and sizes. These industrial considerations are combined with a design that ensures maximum freedom to customise details and materials. The sofas are upholstered in Pelle Frau® leather and fabric for indoor use and waterproof fabrics for outdoors. These materials offer extraordinary textures accented by some striking craft finishes, such as the leather weaves on the backs and sides of the armchairs, which wrap around curved wood profiles featuring fluid and organic shapes.

Poltrona Frau and the yachting industry: a longstanding partnership with interesting growth prospects

Designing for the marine sector is imprinted in Poltrona Frau’s DNA. In the 1930s, the brand began making furnishings for the luxurious ocean liners of the time and went on to gradually consolidate its expertise in non-residential projects of exceptional construction complexity. This is the defining mission of Poltrona Frau’s Custom Interiors division, which develops special furnishings for communal spaces and the contract market, including the yachting industry.

In a fruitful relationship of co-operation with the customer, Poltrona Frau translates the spirit and philosophy behind every project into products of impeccable workmanship and exquisite detailing, supervising all the design, production and logistics phases and overcoming the numerous constraints involved in different spaces, types and uses.

Poltrona Frau combines the great tradition of craftsmanship that characterises the company’s know-how with the most advanced and innovative trends in the yachting sector, taking “made-to-measure” to another level while also maintaining the brand’s unmistakeable style.