The Picchiotti saga is deeply rooted in Tuscan history. It begins in Florence, when Grand Duke Cosimo de’ Medici opened the Canale dei Navicelli in 1603 to connect the Arno with Pisa and Livorno. By then, the Picchiotti family name had already been recorded – in 1575 – as authorised boat builders in Limite sull’Arno.

Since that first mention, generations of Picchiotti shipwrights have shaped the sea with new eyes, guiding the passage from wood to iron, from steel to aluminium, and ultimately to the birth of modern yachting. Across the centuries, Picchiotti has built vessels for the Italian Navy, merchant shipping and, most memorably, the world’s earliest leisure yachts.

The milestones are legendary: L’Espresso (1902), Italy’s first pleasure yacht; Espero (1905), the gentleman yacht; Puccini’s beloved Liu’; the Kon Tiki (1947), Anita (1955), Solitaire (1977); and the mighty Al Said (1982), at 103 metres among the world’s largest of its time. More recently, the Vitruvius Explorer series – Falco Moscata, Galileo G, Nautilus – wrote another contemporary chapter.

Today this heritage finds new life at Marina di Carrara, within The Italian Sea Group, where Picchiotti once again follows its own timeless course. Here, a tradition of 450 years is not preserved as memory, but reborn as future – the eternal seal of the sea.