Three boat-crazy friends created their own shipyard in the early 1980s to repair laminated wood boats. Little could they have imagined the future: Pershing Yachts, one of the most recognizable power-yacht brands around. From its first launch in 1985 to its latest, every yacht and superyacht has embraced sinuous lines and speed.
Tilli Antonelli, Fausto Filippetti, and Giuliano Onori (above) established Cantiere Navale dell’Adriatico in Mondolfo, Italy, in 1981 The name honored the Adriatic Sea at Mondolfo’s doorstep. Their focus on repair work switched to building their own boats with the launch of the Pershing 45 in 1985. The styling caught attention, but the 35-knot performance demanded it. Both came from designer Fulvio De Simoni, whose relationship with Pershing Yachts remains to this day.
Buyers in Europe were the initial customers for the speedy, sporty, and sexy Pershing Yachts models. In the 1990s, the builder expanded its reach into more markets, particularly following the acquisition in 1998 by the Ferretti Group. The Group’s stronger international reach included the United States. American owners who love nothing more than leaving South Florida in the morning and making it to the Bahamas for lunch appreciated the engineering adaptations that followed. For instance, the builder adopted surface-piercing propellers. These benefit from lower drag than conventional propellers, especially at higher speeds. Additionally, the combination of waterjets and a gas turbine, the latter delivering upwards of 5,100 hp, made the Pershing 115 (below) one of the fastest yachts in her category. With her standard diesels, the package produced a 55-knot top end for the model, which debuted in 2004.
Of course, buyers gained benefits beyond performance. With the Italian supplier Besenzoni, Pershing Yachts introduced a sliding-glass door between the saloon and aft deck that tucked away. Even the Pershing 45 had a hydraulic passerelle, also developed with Besenzoni. Five years ago, meanwhile, the Pershing 7X premiered with an uninterrupted windscreen—the builder’s first model without mullions.
All the while, the Italian builder has been taking advantage of lightweight developments in fiberglass construction. It applies from the smallest model to the superyachts, the latter including the current Pershing GTX116 yacht series (above). However, since it wants to keep customers in the family longer, it has added larger superyacht models in aluminum. The Pershing 140 (below) remains the flagship, seeing construction at the Ferretti Group Super Yacht Yard in Ancona.
The Ancona site is just southeast of Pershing’s fiberglass production, which has remained in Mondolfo since day one. Of course, it has a much larger footprint than all those years ago when the Pershing 45 launched. Currently, four buildings, two paint booths, and a test tank are on site. Notably, the fourth building exclusively constructs the GTX series, for yachts to 125 feet (38 meters). Overall, 27 Pershing models can undergo construction and outfitting side by side from one building to the next.
Pershing Yachts pershing-yacht.com
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