Savannah

• LOA: 83.5 m
• Gross tonnage: 2,250 GT
• Beam: 12.5 m
• Delivered: 2015
• Builder: Feadship (Aalsmeer)
• Design: CG Design (exterior and interior)
• Propulsion: Hybrid, single diesel engine plus Azipull thruster, five modes
• Guests / crew: around 12 / around 22 to 26

The yacht that started the hybrid era

Savannah earned her place in yachting history as the world's first hybrid superyacht when she was delivered in 2015. At 83.5 metres she introduced a way of combining diesel and electric power that had not been seen on a yacht of her size. Built at the Feadship yard in Aalsmeer, she broke with convention in almost every system that mattered. Her arrival changed the conversation about what a large yacht could be. Much of the low-emission technology now spreading through the wider fleet can be traced back to this single hull.

Her influence is easy to measure against what followed. Feadship itself uses Savannah as the baseline for its later hybrids, noting how far battery capacity and efficiency have advanced since. She won Motor Yacht of the Year at the 2016 World Superyacht Awards, a recognition of how completely she rethought the type. More than a decade on she still looks and feels contemporary. Savannah proved that bold engineering and genuine beauty could arrive in the same hull.

CG Design and a mirror finish

The exterior and interior were both shaped by CG Design of Paris, led by Cristina Gherardi, working with De Voogt on the naval architecture. The most striking exterior decision was the paint, since Savannah became the first superyacht finished entirely in metallic colour, a soft sea-foam green that shifts with the light. The metallic treatment extends across the hull, superstructure and even fixed deck furniture. A floating superstructure effect and open aft decks add to her distinctive look.

That styling was more than surface drama. The open aft arrangement blurs the line between the yacht and the water around her, giving guests an unusually close connection to the sea. Deck spaces flow into one another rather than sitting in rigid tiers. The metallic paint, difficult to apply on this scale, was a statement of both taste and technical confidence. Savannah still stands out in any anchorage, which speaks to how well the original vision has aged.

The world's first hybrid superyacht, with a mirror-metallic hull and an underwater lounge.

The Nemo lounge and the pool

The signature interior space is the Nemo lounge, an underwater room set into the hull on the port side. Through large glazed panels guests can watch the sea outside, and by turning around they look into the adjacent swimming pool, which runs to roughly nine metres. The lounge can also serve as a cinema, using advanced glass technology that was pioneering when she launched. It remains one of the most copied ideas in modern yacht design.

The rest of the interior, also by CG Design, accommodates around 12 guests in a calm and contemporary style. The lower guest count for her size gives the cabins and social rooms real generosity of space. Materials and detailing follow the Feadship standard, with the interior tuned to the yacht's playful and original character. A crew of roughly two dozen supports guests aboard. The result is a home that feels personal and inventive rather than formal.

One shaft, five modes

The heart of Savannah is her hybrid propulsion, built around a single main diesel engine, three generators and a bank of Corvus batteries of about one megawatt-hour. Drive reaches the water through a single central propeller working alongside an azimuthing Azipull thruster, which sits in the propeller's slipstream to recover energy. She was the first yacht to combine an Azipull with a variable-pitch propeller in this way. The system offers five operating modes, from manoeuvring and pure diesel-electric to a high-speed boost.

What made this clever was the efficiency wrung from a single propulsion line. The streamlined hull and the slipstream thruster together added several per cent of efficiency over a standard twin-shaft arrangement, and the yard claimed fuel savings of up to 30 per cent. Being able to select a mode to suit the moment let the yacht run economically at anchor, cruise quietly, or push for speed when needed. The engineering was genuinely experimental for its time, yet it has proved durable in service.

A pioneer's legacy

Savannah has been reported as the yacht of the late Swedish-Canadian financier Lukas Lundin, though Feadship has never confirmed her ownership. She was a bold commission for any owner, since building the first hybrid superyacht carried real technical risk. That willingness to experiment gave the whole industry a working proof of concept. The awards and press attention that followed confirmed the gamble had paid off. Savannah showed what was possible when an owner backed genuine innovation.

Her market legacy is larger than any single sale. By demonstrating that hybrid power could work on a superyacht, she opened a path that Feadship and its rivals have followed ever since. Yachts like Obsidian build directly on the ground she broke. For collectors, a vessel with this much historical weight holds a value that goes beyond its specification. Savannah is remembered as the yacht that pointed the industry towards a cleaner future.

Design

• Exterior: De Voogt Naval Architects (Feadship) with CG Design
• Interior: CG Design (Cristina Gherardi Bernardeau / Marcello Bozzarelli)
• Naval architecture: Feadship - De Voogt Naval Architects

Who it is for: Collectors and owners drawn to a landmark yacht, one that pioneered hybrid power and still feels original more than a decade on.

Guide price: Listed for sale with Edmiston asking approx. USD 170 million (Sept 2023), reduced to approx. EUR 140 million (2024); sold in-house at Edmiston in 2025. Sources: BOAT International, YachtBuyer, SuperYacht Times.