Kasper 7: the 36-hour brief that remade a 67m spec Benetti
Reopening a spec hull
Kasper 7 began as a Benetti spec project, already in the early stages of construction when Karim and Nisrine Karagulla bought it during the pandemic as the successor to their 18-year-old Benetti Classic. The first decision was the purchase itself: take the delivery slot a spec hull offers, then treat the design as still open. Benetti delivered the 1,250 GT yacht in 2023.
Exterior designer Giorgio M. Cassetta and the yard's project manager sat down with the owners early in the project, and in an intense 36 hours the group settled window modifications and a long list of layout changes. BOAT International reports that nearly everything was developed in that sitting, which tells a buyer where the leverage sits: before steelwork closes the options, with every decision-maker in one room.
Steel and glass decisions
The most visible call was the glazing. Nisrine Karagulla, founder of the interior architecture firm Askdeco, scrapped the planned rows of vertical and horizontal windows and specified two round portholes of 1.9 metres in diameter, with smaller round ones for the lower deck. "I thought it would look nice if I gave it a vintage look," she told BOAT International.
The bulwarks came down too, reduced in height on the main and upper decks to pull in light and the view. These are structural changes with cost and schedule attached, and Kasper 7 shows they can still be won on a hull already in build. Custom awnings in citrus-yellow and white stripes, drawn from Mediterranean parasols, carried the same decisiveness into the soft kit.
The discipline of subtraction
Inside, the sharpest decisions are removals. The cinema lounge that shares the upper deck with the owner's suite holds the only television on board, and mirrored surfaces are deliberately scarce. The dining room sits forward on the main deck, set around a pink resin table by the artist Wonmin Park with seating for 14 and a sculptural bar by the studio Sayar & Garibeh.
The jury at the 2025 BOAT Design & Innovation Awards gave Kasper 7 Best Interior Design among motor yachts of 500 GT and above, and the 67-metre also took Best Naval Architecture for displacement motor yachts. For an owner writing a brief this season, the working lesson is plain: the trophies went to a set of early, specific decisions, and every one of them is the kind you can put in a contract.
What owners and crew report
Owner rejected a conventional, restrained superyacht palette
Nisrine Karagulla, the yacht's owner and founder of Beirut interior architecture studio Askdeco, said of her approach to Kasper 7: "I didn't want to create something boring, but something colourful and asymmetrical."
BOOTE MagazinExterior designer confirms the bulwarks were physically lowered during the redesign
Giorgio Cassetta of Cassetta Yacht Designers said the height of the main-deck bulwark and the upper-deck side bulwark were significantly reduced during the collaborative redesign, and separately called the integration of Karagulla's interior with his exterior "probably the best I've seen on a boat on which we were not both interior and exterior designer."
BOAT InternationalShipyard leadership frames the interior as a genuine departure from Benetti's usual output
Giovanna Vitelli, President of the Azimut-Benetti Group, described Kasper 7's interior as "a truly new interpretation of interiors, not only in design, but also in lifestyle."
Barche Magazine
What is good, and what to watch
Strong points
- Recognition came from a juried panel across two separate technical categories, not just publicityAt the 2025 BOAT Design & Innovation Awards in Kitzbuhel, Kasper 7 won both Best Interior Design (Motor Yachts over 500GT) and Best Naval Architecture (Displacement Motor Yachts) - the naval architecture citation praising work that "seamlessly combined technical precision with aesthetic sophistication," a category judged separately from the interior.
- The redesign changed real hull and superstructure geometry, not just decorationCassetta, the naval architect/exterior designer of record, confirmed the main-deck and upper-deck bulwark heights were physically reduced and Benetti's standard porthole configuration was replaced with paired 1.9-metre-diameter round windows - structural and steelwork changes to a hull already under construction, independently verified by the professional who had to execute them.
- A third-party environmental metric survived the redesignKasper 7 holds a 3-star SEA Index certification, an emissions rating verified by Lloyd's Register - a benchmark independent of Benetti's or the owner's own marketing language.
- The outside naval architect's praise for owner/exterior integration carries some weight precisely because it wasn't his designCassetta was not the interior designer, so his assessment that the interior-exterior integration was better than on projects where he controlled both disciplines is a professional judgment about someone else's intrusion into his hull design, not self-praise.
What to watch
- The financial and schedule cost of the mid-build redesign is undisclosedNo source - Benetti, BOAT International, Askdeco, or any trade title found - states how much additional time or budget the yard needed to cut new window openings and revise the layout of a hull already under construction as a speculative build. A 36-hour design sprint compressed into an in-build hull necessarily creates cost and schedule consequences somewhere in the production line; none are reported.
- Nearly all published accounts trace back to Benetti-adjacent or owner-adjacent voicesThe redesign narrative appears in near-identical form across BOAT International, Benetti's own newsroom, BOOTE Magazin, Barche Magazine and other yacht trade titles, sourced almost entirely from Cassetta, Azimut-Benetti Group president Giovanna Vitelli, and Karagulla herself. No independent naval architect, surveyor, or rival designer assessment of the redesign's execution was found in public record.
- Deliberate amenity omissions are untested against the charter/resale marketThe owners chose to omit a swimming pool and in-cabin televisions - framed as a stylistic statement ("the sea is there for that") rather than a limitation - but this is also a departure from amenities standard on comparable 60m-plus charter yachts. Kasper 7 is confirmed not currently marketed for charter, so the trade-off has not been market-tested.
- Interior design credit is shared, complicating a single-vision narrativeBOAT International's own yacht directory lists the interior designer as both "Benetti" and "Ask Deco," indicating Benetti's in-house Interior Style department was also involved in execution - the finished interior is not solely the product of the owner's independent 36-hour redesign, as the press narrative can imply.
Practical detail
| Build cost | Not publicly disclosed. No source - Benetti, BOAT International, or brokerage listings - states a contract or build value; Kasper 7 has never been listed for sale. |
|---|---|
| Length / tonnage | 67.0-67.16 m LOA, 10.9 m beam, 3.45 m draft, 1,250 GT (BOAT International superyacht directory). |
| Propulsion / performance | Twin Caterpillar 3512E diesels (1,350 kW each per BOOTE Magazin); top speed 16 knots, cruising around 12 knots; range approximately 5,000 nautical miles. |
| Tankage | Fuel capacity approximately 127,000 litres; fresh water approximately 24,000 litres (BOOTE Magazin). |
| Accommodation | Up to 10 guests in four suites; crew reported as 17 (BOAT International directory) or 19 (some trade coverage) - figures are inconsistent across sources. |
| Award | 2025 BOAT Design & Innovation Awards, Kitzbuhel - winner, Best Interior Design (Motor Yachts over 500GT) and Best Naval Architecture (Displacement Motor Yachts). |
| Delivery / ownership | Launched May 2023, delivered August 2023 to named owners Nisrine and Karim Karagulla; flagged in Malta. Not reported as sold or relisted since delivery. |
| Charter availability | Not available for charter; YachtCharterFleet confirms the yacht is not currently marketed for private charter. |
| Not publicly known | The build/contract value, and the specific schedule or cost impact the yard absorbed to re-cut window openings and revise the layout on a hull already in construction, have not been disclosed by Benetti, the owners, or any outlet reviewed. |
Questions this story answers
What happened?
In one 36-hour working session, the owners of the 67-metre Benetti Kasper 7 redrew the windows and much of the layout of a hull already in build, and those decisions carried the yacht to two categories at the 2025 BOAT Design & Innovation Awards. BOAT International's account of the project reads as a decision log, and it rewards study before you sign for a hull that is already in the shed.
What is good about it?
Recognition came from a juried panel across two separate technical categories, not just publicity. At the 2025 BOAT Design & Innovation Awards in Kitzbuhel, Kasper 7 won both Best Interior Design (Motor Yachts over 500GT) and Best Naval Architecture (Displacement Motor Yachts) - the naval architecture citation praising work that "seamlessly combined technical precision with aesthetic sophistication," a category judged separately from the interior.
What should an owner or buyer watch?
The financial and schedule cost of the mid-build redesign is undisclosed. No source - Benetti, BOAT International, Askdeco, or any trade title found - states how much additional time or budget the yard needed to cut new window openings and revise the layout of a hull already under construction as a speculative build. A 36-hour design sprint compressed into an in-build hull necessarily creates cost and schedule consequences somewhere in the production line; none are reported.
What do owners and crew report?
Nisrine Karagulla, the yacht's owner and founder of Beirut interior architecture studio Askdeco, said of her approach to Kasper 7: "I didn't want to create something boring, but something colourful and asymmetrical." (BOOTE Magazin)
Who reported this?
BOAT International, Benetti, Askdeco, BOAT Design & Innovation Awards, BOOTE Magazin, Barche Magazine, YachtCharterFleet, Cassetta Yacht Designers.
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