When you step aboard one of our catamarans, you’re standing on the result of countless engineering decisions — each one a deliberate balance between performance, safety, durability, and livability. Here’s a look at how we think about building boats that are truly built to last.
Engineered for Safety, Certified for the Ocean
Every boat we build is engineered by Deto Yacht Design, where our team oversees laminate schedules, resin mixes, and structural integrity from the ground up. That work is guided by compliance with the International Marine Certification Institute (IMCI) in Belgium — the body behind what’s known as CE certification.
We build to Category A offshore, the highest classification standard, because we’re building offshore cruising boats. The regulations are rigorous, and we embrace them. In fact, on major structural components, we routinely engineer to a 2:1 safety factor — meaning we double the calculated load capacity. That translates to heavier laminate schedules and more resin, but it also means you’re sailing on a boat with an enormous structural margin built in.
Racing boats don’t do this. They engineer to the edge. We build cruising boats — performance cruising boats — and that distinction matters.
The Performance vs. Comfort Balance
There’s a constant tension in building a performance cruising catamaran. You can engineer a boat right to the minimum threshold, shaving every gram. Or you can over-engineer it into a heavy, sluggish vessel. The art is in finding the balance.
Take something as simple as a cockpit hatch. Could we make it lighter? Yes. But we know someone’s going to sit on it someday — so we build it strong. The same thinking applies to our cabinetry: it’s foam-core and light, but we offer far more storage volume than many performance competitors. We could strip out half the cabinetry to save weight, but then the boat simply wouldn’t be livable. And livability is the point.
Glass windows are another example. They’re heavier than Lexan alternatives, but glass doesn’t yellow, doesn’t shrink, and provides far superior visibility over the life of the boat. It’s a weight trade-off we make deliberately and without apology.
Escape Hatches: A Necessary Compromise
CE certification requires escape hatches — a way out of the boat if it’s ever inverted. We comply, but we’ve evolved our approach. Rather than opening hatches (which have a well-documented history of leaking and failing), we now use fixed hatches designed to be broken open with a small hammer in an emergency.
Frankly, we believe you could exit an inverted catamaran without them. But the regulation stands, and we build to it.
It’s worth noting: the American Boat and Yacht Council (ABYC) does not require escape hatches. CE certification, however, is required to flag a boat in the European Union. For any manufacturer eyeing global resale value, building to CE standards isn’t just a safety choice — it’s a smart business decision.
Why Beam Matters More Than You Think
Our catamarans run slightly wider than the typical 50/50 beam-to-length ratio common in the industry — and that’s intentional. Beam on a catamaran works like a keel on a monohull: more beam equals more stability.
Greater stability means we can carry larger sail plans without increasing wetted surface area. The result? Our boats sail noticeably better in light air, and you reef later. A narrower cat has to depower earlier, which hurts upwind performance significantly.
We design our boats to reach a 4.5-degree heel angle before we recommend reefing — a comfortable, controlled sailing angle. We don’t design boats to fly a hull, and we don’t encourage it. It’s not a structural limitation; it’s simply not seamanlike on a cruising boat. Our reefing guidelines are designed to keep sailors in control and out of hairy situations.
The Bottom Line
Every decision — from laminate schedules to window glass to beam width — reflects a single underlying philosophy: build a boat that is light, strong, safe, durable, and genuinely livable. That’s a harder target to hit than optimizing for any one of those qualities alone. But it’s the only standard worth building to.
