Cannes Yachting Festival Ph © Yachting Festival Cannes. Abracadabra Studios
Cannes Yachting Festival Ph © Yachting Festival Cannes. Abracadabra Studios

Elegance, clean lines, calm seas, vast horizons, and the easy life. These defining features translate into a new visual identity, a foretaste of the rich array of the Yachting show’s selections featuring three boats representing the largest boat show in Europe – a super yacht, a sailing catamaran and a dayboat – as well as the usual magical elegance of the Cannes Yachting Festival, lit up from one end to the other of the famous Croisette.

The Yachting Festival in Cannes, the first international boat show of the season, is back from September 6 to 11, 2022 with a diverse array of boats and world premieres from top shipyards (Sunseeker, Ferretti, Baglietto, Azimut Benetti, and Palumbo, just to name a few), modern and innovative nautical equipment, high-end services, and a plethora of innovations. 

Visitors “will have the pleasure of discovering the finest gems on the water and on the ground, of all sizes and of all types, equipped with a ‘classic’ engine or future-oriented with the first integrated electric, hybrid, and hydrogen propulsion systems,” says Sylvie Ernoult, director of the Yachting Festival, and adds, “We are pleased to support our exhibitors in their eco-responsible development by helping them highlight their innovations, especially on our Green Route and Innovation Village. The nautical industry is lessening its environmental footprint little by little, and we’re following its example by strengthening our eco-responsible commitment within the show’s organization.” 

An industry category for each port 

The Cannes Yachting Festival will take place in a variety of locations as it does every year, each one focused on a specific category. The Vieux Port, one of the oldest ports on the Côte d’Azur, will be the site of about 490 motor boats from 5 to 45 meters in length, 80 of which – those under 10 meters – will be exhibited on the ground.

Luxury international shipyards will have their own space for boats above 22 meters long on the Jetée. About thirty motor yachts over 24 meters long will be moored at the Super Yachts Extension (SYE) of the port, three floating barges set up specifically for the show.

Vieux Port

Sailing area

Continuous with the SYE, on the other side of the crosswalk, the Quai Max Laubeuf will hold about twenty motor catamarans up to 24 meters long and 12 wide, along with 40 small monohulls. There will be 60 rigid and semi-rigid hull small motor boats as well as a space for outboard and inboard engines. Next-generation motorboats and luxurious daily boats will be shown along the Quai Saint-Pierre, along with some medium-sized open and flybridge boats.

Other motorboats, up to 20 meters long, will be arranged in ascending order along the Pantiero where they will be moored across from 60 semi-rigid hull boats from 10 to 17 meters long and in an area for about fifteen hybrid and electric boats. The naval shipyards and equipment and nautical accessory and equipment village will be on ground and covering an area of over 4,600 square meters. The Palais des Festivals and Luxury Gallery will focus on luxury with areas reserved for operators and tender and toy spaces with all the latest innovations.

Electric boats space

Port Canto, on the other side of the Croisette, hosts three different nautical exhibitions distributed in as many spaces. The Sailing area, with its 4,000 square meters of docks, hosts 115 monohulls and multihulls from 10 to 28 meters. The heart of the exhibition is the Innovation Village, launched in 2021, created in partnership with Mer Angels and BNP Paribas Banque Privée to spotlight “smart” start-ups in the nautical sector. This is followed by the Yacht Brokerage area, featuring major French and international players in the second-hand yacht market.

Toys space

Finally, the Toys space, an on-shore exhibition that shows a rich variety of equipment and water toys for fun and nautical activities: increasingly fascinating, sporty, technologically sophisticated and eco-responsible, these jewels of the sea add fun and excitement to the boating experience.

Photo © Yachting Festival Cannes — Abracadabra Studios