It is one of the largest and most expensive private yachts in the world. The Mexican millionaire Ricardo Salinas Pliego bought this ship, valued at around 200 million euros, from Saudi tycoon Nasser Al-Rashid in 2020.
What makes this ship so special are the details with which it was designed by Italian architect Luigi Sturchio and built in the German shipyard of Blohm Voss. Among those details there is one that already shows the owner’s commitment to luxury, such as the golden letters of the name and the distinctive coat of arms, made of 24-carat gold.
The interior of the ‘Lady Moura’ is distributed in a length (length) of 105 meters and 20 meters beam (width). The four levels are distributed in this space. Two diesel engines of 6.900 horsepower gives it a speed of 20 knots, however the yacht is designed with a system to compensate the weights that notably reduces the possible roll.
The love story behind this impressive boat
The ‘Lady Moura’ is the most opulent symbol of the love story between Al-Rashid and Mouna Ayoub. He met this woman when she was 18 years old and working in a Lebanese restaurant in Paris. They married in 1979 and the boat was one of the gifts the tycoon gave her. The ‘Lady Moura’ would be for Mouna her floating palace in the Balearic Islands, but, at the end of her married life, a kind of golden cage. The couple divorced in 1997.
The mega yacht ‘Lady Moura‘ opens the season in the new marina of the port of Ibiza
It was a few years later when Ayoub wrote a book about his story: “It is the testimony of a woman subjected to the laws of a sexist, fundamentalist and retrograde society,” she later said. “People don’t understand it. They say I was showered with gold, diamonds, dresses and cars. That’s true. But when you are rejected by an entire society, all the wealth in the world is not enough.” She has been subjected to torrents of abuse from the Saudi press, which says she married for money and separated only to spend her husband’s billions.
At present, Ayoub, owns more than 2.700 pieces of haute couture making his collection one of the largest in the world. Last November 20, 252 of his pieces, designed by Karl Lagerfeld for Chanel, went on sale in Paris.
She never wears the same dress twice, and sometimes never. She estimates that 90 percent of Chanel’s auction lots have never been worn in public. Instead, they have been preserved in special boxes that lie flat and are protected from light, dust, humidity and the archenemy, moths, in a high-security warehouse outside Paris.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.