Many yacht owners spend much of their time in workaday lives only to escape to weekends and vacations on the boat. And no wonder they do: The time aboard can let a yachtsman get out of a rut and exercise control over his fate. The pilothouse offers a transformation, à la Superman's telephone booth-well, maybe not quite to that extreme, but you get the meaning: It certainly is empowering to take in that view from the helm as you leave the dock without a look back.
The yacht Man of Steel has some superhero attributes in its own right. The custom-designed and built 164-foot trideck motoryacht, the recent and largest-yet delivery from Holland's Heesen Yachts, is strong and protective of those aboard, yet has a soft spot for children.
 |
Of course, the DC Comics hero Superman is the original "man of steel," and subject of countless live action and animated film and television adaptations-an homage to him exists aboard the yacht in the form of a large mural, as well as a stylized logo on the transom that is reminiscent of the superhero's symbol. The yacht's name, however, refers to the North American owner Barry Zekelman's steel business, and the logo bears not an "S" but a "Z" within the boundary of the familiar shield.
Man of Steel rides on a displacement hull constructed of-what else?-steel. She shares a family resemblance to Heesen's smaller, series-built yachts, owing to their common origination from Omega Design, but her reverse pilothouse windshield and other details distinguish her profile from these earlier designs.
