BBC Documentaries

Britain's Biggest Superyachts: Chasing Perfection (2016x106)

: 15, 2016

Welcome to Sunseeker, Britain's biggest superyacht builder who has been hand-building customised boats for the world's super rich for the past 50 years. For the first time ever, they have allowed the BBC behind the scenes of their extraordinary production line in Poole and into the rarefied world of the multi-millionaire's favourite plaything. The company built their reputation on making small to mid-size yachts, but the recession saw this market flounder as even the super-rich tightened their belts, seeing Sunseeker sink into the red. So in a high stakes move, they're sinking millions into building a larger opulent superyacht to reel in the uber-rich who still have cash to splash on life's ultimate luxuries to help sail them back into profit. The film follows the build of a new £20m, forty-metre superyacht and their most challenging specification to date when a customer takes full advantage of their made to measure service and asks for more extras than any other yacht in the history of the company. When it falls behind schedule we discover it's not all plain sailing when you're in the business of engineering luxury for the super-rich. Whilst the Poole shipyard works hard to meet the customer's exacting standards, the London sales team are working just as hard to fill the order book during the all-important Boat Show season where they hope to sell over £40m worth of boats in just thirty days. Every boat is built in Poole but is found basking in the international playgrounds of the rich and famous and, filming across the summer season, we also hop on board the charter side of the business to meet the people paying £60,000 for just a week's holiday.