When the owner of the 144-foot Heesen Bliss bought her in 2017, he was looking at the yacht’s bones, not her decor. The previous owner had been a decorator with, well, highly personalized tastes.
“There was a lot of purple, and a lot of dark green velvet on the walls,” says Michel Chryssicopoulos, a partner at IYC, which manages Bliss for sale and charter.
“I’m sure that years ago, it looked very good, but after 12 years, she needed a major refit, which happened.”
As you can see in the photographs above, the interior now has bits of fun colors bubbling up here and there, as opposed to forcing guests to bathe in them. Chryssicopoulos says that what is shown in the salon photo represents the approach the owner took throughout the vessel.
“Everything is off-white now, light gray, very earthy,” he says. “There’s a lot more light in the interior. All of the carpets, the soft fabrics, the curtains, all of it was replaced. There was a fake fireplace in the main salon, and it was replaced by backlit onyx marble that was custom-built. That looks very nice. The main dining area had a simple glass top; now it has a nice marble top. The whole thing smells and looks fresh.”
The owner keeps Bliss based in Greece and regularly offers itineraries in Turkey, Croatia and Montenegro. If charter clients want to book in France or Italy, then the owner will consider those inquiries as well, but Chryssicopoulos says there has been so much demand for charters in Greece that the yacht had no reason to move.
“Charter is just through the roof,” he told Yachting in mid-July. “I was just spending a week in Mykonos—you should have seen all the yachts. It was much crazier than usual.”
And everywhere that Bliss goes, she brings multiple tenders with her for heading ashore, watersports and crew use. There is a Williams Turbojet 325, an 18-foot Dariel jet boat that reportedly can hit 35 knots, and a 42-foot Sacs called Little Bliss.
Also on board are a pair of Jet Skis, a Seabob and stand-up paddleboards. Those types of toys, a captain who has been aboard for eight years and has strong local knowledge, and the yacht’s new look inside and out from the refit are bringing bookings, Chryssicopoulos says. And the yacht also is for sale, which means potential owners are getting a sneak peek at the type of income they might generate should they keep her on the charter market.
“She’s already done five weeks of charter this season alone,” he says of this past summer, “and she has another five booked.”
