Nautor’s Swan and Baltic Yachts have just launched their biggest yachts, respectively the German Frers-designed 131ft Aritarchos for a Greek repeat customer, and Pink Gin, a Judel Vrolijk-designed 152-footer also for a repeat customer.

The Swan 131 is a real belt-and-braces affair because she not only has twin rudders, but also twin engines. This isn’t purely for manoeuvrabily – she has a 100hp bow-thruster and a 70hp stern-thruster to help in close quarters – but also to enable the yacht go stern-to on walls in ports and off beaches throughout the Aegean and Mediterranean. With the rudders drawing just 2.8m, the yacht should be able to get within passerelle distance but the seabed should shelve sufficiently to accommodate a keel more than 20m away which draws 4.8m.

The deck is dominated by a large, teardrop-shaped saloon coachroof, which seems almost too big even for this 131-footer. The cockpit is vast, with a large dining area that has extensive seating and two control consoles.

All sails are on furlers and there are captive winches for the mainsheet and main halyard. An automatic release button for the main, linked into the boom vang, can be activated in an emergency.

Nautor’s Boat Building Technology Centre in Jakobstad, Finland, is really coming into its own and Simone Marconcini, who manages the multi-centred workforce, has ordered an extension to the building, so ultimately all Swan yachts can be completed here. Mould production, including plug-milling, is still handled at the Kallby plant.

One of the more extraordinary statistics of the Nautor’s Swan yard is that five German Frers-designed Swan 90s have been ordered before the first yacht started building. The 90 is a really handsome yacht and promises to create a hot and impressive class on the race track.

Tom Blomgren, who runs the custom side of Swan production, said that nothing under 90ft should now be seen as custom, although a Luca Brenta 76 had just been launched, a Bill Tripp-designed 78 was under way and a one-off Frers 85 was also in the pipeline.

The latter is designed as a specialist performance yacht and will come with what Nautor refer to as a 40ft ‘kitchen’ boat, a support vessel, which will follow the race boat as a mother ship.