From the Ziggurat to the Brava, 5 years of Cult IOR by maestro Vallicelli

Speaking of IOR, and contextualizing it to the Mediterranean and Italian panorama, it is impossible not to come across design figures who have risen to legend.
The Italian context, in fact, was undoubtedly populated by iconic hulls and brilliant pencils, creators of a season that has remained etched in the annals.
Among them, to make the Golden Age of Sailing what it was, a name still talked about today, stamped in memories: Vallicelli.
Now, to explore all the design that emerged from the Studio, would be complex and, perhaps, verbose, but nonetheless interesting and fundamental is to look at what came into being, if nothing else, in the early stages of activity, a golden period destined to mark the path for all that was to come. Dto the Ziggurat to the Brava (eventually ending up at Azzurra) here are Vallicelli cults from 1975 to 1980.

Studio Vallicelli: the forge of the homegrown IOR

The input, now absorbed into legend, was born with the 1976Half Ton Cup in Trieste: it was Ziggurat, the impetus for the first successes in the international arena.
This was immediately followed by Gattone, One Tonner launched also in ’76, and Argento Vivo, in ’77, winner of the Three Quarter Ton Cup in La Rochelle.
The numbers continued, the successes as well, but it would be with Filo da Torcere and Brava that the effort would result in an unparalleled leap in quality.
Let us start, however, at the beginning.

• DO YOU HAVE AN IOR SIGNED VALLICELLI ?
  CELEBRATE IT IN THE CLASSIC BOAT ARCHIVE, IT’S THAT EASY: CLICK HERE AND ENTER THE BOAT.

The beginnings

Ziggurat, it is known, is the first major success.
Fifth class IOR, she was born with the aim of participating in the Trieste Half Ton Cup in September ’76, and took shape as a medium-displacement strong with a masthead-rigged and particularly generous sail plan.
As with Ganbare (D. Peterson) years earlier, Ziggurat began as a collective project, a joint study carried out by friends-colleagues.
The preponderant inspiration is from the school of Peterson and Mull, to which, however, are applied notions of other derivation, more set to what was then the American canon.
Its own peculiarities, however, it has them all, starting with the smaller displacement and increased aft section, as well as the different tapering of the keel, to name a few.
In parallel, she already has the hallmarks that would later become the firm’s trademark, first and foremost the “Vallicelli” deckhouse, that is, with a continuous, low, trapezoidal section, flared and without a porthole.
As is well known, Ziggurat will finish third in that Half Ton Cup, will be immediately purchased while, with CPR, a production version will take off, giving birth to the legendary Ziggurat 916.

Ziggurat concluded, in collaboration with Carlo Alberto Tiberio (conproprietor of Artmare), it takes shape Gattone, another early cult hull. It is a One Tonner this time, strong on the lessons of the Ziggurat, but with even more extreme shapes.
The maximum beam is further back, the stern narrower, and she has two separate cockpits, one for the helmsman, one for running rigging.
She would win the Giraglia and the Mediterranean Championship, later becoming a production product in the form of Artmare’s V-Cat 38.

The successes of the first two hulls attracted early attention and, from Trieste-based Franco Zago, a second One Tonner arrived on commission: El Cid.
Built, for the first time, in laminated wood, El Cid would learn the lessons learned with Gattone, making her own a stern with fuller sections and a more classic, one-cockpit deck, resulting in a hull capable of appearing well in regattas, with several Barcolana wins in real. It was with 1977, however, that the first real leap in quality came; the following was born Argento Vivo, Three Quarter Tonner commissioned by Pigi Vigliani and Riccardo Trionfi.
Fine bow and increased stern volumes make her an all-round medium displacement hull.
She would win the Italian Championships in ’77 and ’78, as well as record a second place at the Three Quarter Ton Cup in La Rochelle.

Vallicelli Studio: the rise

The late 1970s saw a massive increase in commissions.
After Argento Vivo comes another project, another novelty, right away.
È Fox Hunt, the studio’s first LDB (Light Displacement Boat).
Made of marine plywood, with an angled section, it is an inexpensive but particularly solid hull, an occasion, moreover, for the implementation of another novelty, the fractional rigging, here at 7/8.
It will follow Asabranca the following year, another LDB, this time, however, smaller: it is another Half Tonner, 9.4 meters versus the 13.4 of Caccia alla Volpe.
Here the big novelty is the movable centreboard, coupled with a particularly generous aft section and a more rounded knee, to reduce the wetted surface when the boat is heeling.

1979 is the year of several hulls, one “bigger” than the other.
Two excellent examples are. Oro Fino (10.15 m), a fourth-class all-round of extreme elegance, and Grandfather Gigi (12.06 m), a medium-light displacement second class. They will then come Excelsior e LSD, but above all will be two projects destined to make their mark.
On the one hand, Twist Wire (11.29), an exceptional One Tonner, on the other, Brava (13.40), legendary hull. Filo da Torcere will win the One Ton Cup in Naples. Designed specifically with that goal in mind, she does in fact have a particularly powerful sail plan, suitable for light winds, and very sharp semi-angles of attack, with maximum beam set rather far back.

To pass into legend, above all others, however, is. Brava, designed by the studio for Pasquale Landolfi.
This is a particularly ambitious design, a daring first class with a medium-heavy displacement, large maximum beam and distinctive hull shapes, very sharp in the semi-attack angles, but almost rhomboidal in the overall section.
The construction thought by Vallicelli is aluminum.
Her early years will be run-in, and then she will become unbeatable on every front in 1982-83 (HERE we tell you more about her story).

Vallicelli Studio: 1980, stepping stone to America’s Cup.

The decade, on the wave of Twisted Wire and Brava, closes with a Two Tonner designed in ’79.
È Blue Show (12.49 m), made in laminated wood by Pezzini (Viareggio) with lines quite different from the previous ones, less tapered towards the bow, where the profile of the starboard is more vertical, a precursor index of what the ’80s would later be.
The knee, however, is even sharper than in her predecessors, especially in her more aft section, creating, overall, an all round hull that prefers medium-light winds.
She will contribute in no small part to the Italian team’s second place at the 1980 Sardinia Cup, becoming, in 1981, a series design in the Show 42 .

To crown the decade, however, will be. Prima Donna, the first project of the 1980s.
This is a 12.66-meter second-class IOR, made of composite and close in design lines to the canons of Filo da Torcere.
A hybridization of the New Zealand school of light displacement, with the American school of medium-heavy displacement, the boat will open to a later phase launched toward the heights of sailing. Indeed, in 1981 came the exceptional commission, the design of the first Italian 12 Meters International Tonnage destined for the America’s Cup:Azzurra. But that is another story.

Between 1976 and 1980 the hulls designed by the Vallicelli Studio are far more than the above, to which are added, in fact, Cactus (9.14 m); Almic (11.2 m); Nostra Signora dei Turchi (11.08 m); Atahualpa (9 m); Manua (12.77 m); Wet Dream (11 m); Botta a Dritta (10.14 m); Drago Azzurro (9.68 m); Asabranca (9.4 m); Leonella Celeste (9.05 m); Ashanti (10.3 m); Nonno Gigi (12.06 m); Cunegonda (11.2 m) and Birbona (10.30 m). If you knew where they were, or if you would like to celebrate their history and vicissitudes, it is very easy, just enter it HERE.
We would be grateful.