MATTEO CAPPELLAZZO & MATTIA PIRO CO-FOUNDERS, CO-OWNERS AND CHIEF DESIGNERS - PC DESIGN
Please tell us a little about your background (education, experience etc.).
Do you have any favourite key elements of the above project?
Matteo: I have a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Design and a master’s degree in Yacht and Cruising Vessel Design. I work in the design field since 2010 and in marine design since 2012. I worked with E.T. Yacht Design in Santa Margherita Ligure and with Maori Yacht and Novamarine in Costa Smeralda, dealing with design, construction and refitting of luxury vessels and sport yachts but also professional crafts. In 2014, together with my friend and colleague Mattia Piro, we founded our independent studio PC Design.
Matteo: Talking about our flagship project ITALIA, its general and radical dissimilarity is the key element: we tried to design differently but preserving at the same time practicality and functionality. This clearly results in the design of the superstructure and of the air intakes and in the arrangement of the main deck.
Mattia: I have a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in Yacht and Cruising Vessel Design. I initially worked in a yacht design office and then headed in a shipyard, where I deepened the knowledge in the production field of fiberglass, aluminium and steel yachts. And lastly, PC Design.
Mattia: Attention to detail is a key element in developing our projects. Also, a project, for being successful, in addition to developing an aesthetically competitive product, must meet the needs of functionality. We live in the age of design: you often end up thinking that the outward appearance – the styling – is as important as the product’s character and technical quality. Good design is rare and to us, for example, getting the proportions of the exterior correct is a major factor in a design quality.
What projects have you recently completed?
What companies have you worked with for the above projects, if any?
We just designed a 28 feet luxury tender, a 32 feet heavy duty craft, the interior of a 22 meter sport yacht, a 63 meter super yacht and we completed and presented our 25 meter hyper yacht concept ITALIA.
All the design processes were led by us while for different technical and engineering matters we consulted professionals such E.T. Yacht Design, Absolute 2001, CD-adapco, Metis Marine, Twin Disc and Caterpillar to name a few.
What project are you currently working on? At the moment we are designing a 52 feet luxury tender, a 50 meter explorer vessel, a 76 meter super yacht and we are preparing some interior design proposals for a 72 feet yacht.
74 Luxe et al
Can you please talk us through your process of design and application. Matteo: Generally, I start settling main ideas, themes and conditions of the project, then I continue producing several sketches. I analyse them verifying and re-discussing hypothesized solutions
and supposing about new ones: this repeats cyclically until I arrive to the final chosen concept. I develop it preparing the definitive proposal and then the executive project that goes in to production. In general the whole process, but especially the concept phase, could take a lot of time but this results in a detailed and accurate project. Mattia: First, I list key entries that must comply with the project, points that depend on us designers (inwards to the shipyard) and by ship owner request. Then through hand-drawn sketches I begin to think about external lines and at the same time I assume a longitudinal section, fundamental in this design phase. Once I have come up with a preliminary product idea, comparing everything I need with engineering is mandatory to close all external and internal lines and continue with the definitive design. Do you have a particular design theme or common influences that run through your projects, i.e. influences from nature such as the sea? We do not have any common theme that you can find recurring in our projects at the moment, this is because every design is original and unique and has his own peculiarities: sometimes these peculiarities derive from outer inspirations while in other cases we preferred to start from scratch from a blank sheet and without fixing any reference. We plan to expand our PC Design models range in the future marking it out with a family feeling descending from project ITALIA.