Elegant superyacht draws attention at marina in Brooklyn Bridge Park

Owned by Berkshire Hathaway billionaire Larry Van Tuyl

July 8, 2023 Mary Frost

The motor yacht Vanish, roughly 235 feet long, easily dwarfs the other yachts at ONE°15 Brooklyn Marina in Brooklyn Bridge Park. Eagle photo by Mary Frost

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Visitors to the Brooklyn Heights Promenade this week are catching an eyeful of the elegant superyacht Vanish, docked at ONE°15 Brooklyn Marina in Brooklyn Bridge Park.

Vanish, at 71.5 meters long (roughly 235 feet), dwarfs the other yachts currently in the marina. (The typical boat docked there is in the 30-45-foot range.)

The $90 million motor yacht can accommodate up to 12 guests “in complete luxury,” with a crew of 20, according to SuperYacht Fan. She has a range of more than 5,200 nautical miles, making her capable of traveling long distances without the need for refueling.

Vanish was built by Feadship, a Dutch yacht-building company based in the Netherlands, according to another superyacht website, Superyacht Times.

The Vanish carries an Airbus helicopter, registration N735VT, with “VT” referring to the yacht’s multibillionaire owner, Larry Van Tuyl. Besides the helicopter, Tuyl also owns a Gulfstream jet. The boat, which costs roughly $10 million a year to operate, is not available for charters, according to SuperYacht Fan.

Van Tuyl, 73, with a reputation as a Republican megadonor, lives in Arizona with his wife Pat. Van Tuyl sold his Van Tuyl Automotive Group to Berkshire Hathaway for roughly $4 billion in 2015. Van Tuyl is now chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Automotive and is still acquiring dealerships, according to Automotive News.

Vanish is not the first spectacular superyacht to dock at ONE°15 Brooklyn Marina. The 240-foot motor vessel Planet Nine, featured in Christopher Nolan’s action film “Tenet,” took up almost the entire rear D dock when it visited the marina. In the film, Planet Nine served as the floating lair of supervillain Andrei Sator (played by Kenneth Branagh). Planet Nine is owned by billionaire financier Nat Rothschild, heir apparent to the title of Baron Rothschild (held by his father).

The marina has also been visited by the fabulous 185-foot Mandango 3, one of the largest sailing yachts in the world. With a main mast 205 feet high, the crew had to remove the antenna to fit under the Verrazano Bridge — at low tide.

Another visitor was the Statsraad Lehmkuhl, Norway’s 107-year-old three-masted tall ship, called by many “the most beautiful ship in the world.” The Statsraad Lehmkuhl (named in honor of Norwegian cabinet minister Kristofer Lehmkuhl) is a maritime training vessel fitted out as a state-of-the-art floating environmental research lab.

Another storied vessel to dock at the marina was the iconic Hudson River sloop Clearwater, founded more than 50 years ago by the late folk musician and eco-activist Pete Seeger. The Clearwater swung by last year as part of the marina’s Community Sail Days program.

The 50-ton French cargo sailboat Grain de Sail — with a load of French wine and chocolate — has also visited the popular marina. Powered by the wind, the transit marked the emergence of a green logistics chain that relies on renewable resources instead of fossil fuels.

Even Little Amal — the famous, 12-foot-tall puppet of a 10-year-old Syrian refugee girl — chose ONE°15 Brooklyn Marina to bid goodbye to New York City after her whirlwind 19-day visit across all five boroughs.

The marina is also the permanent home of Rarebit, one of the few remaining original Wheeler Playmates, the iconic wooden pleasure and fishing yachts of a bygone era. Rarebit is a sister boat to one of the most famous fishing boats of all time — Ernest Hemingway’s Pilar. Rarebit was lovingly restored by actor/producer Matthew Rhys (“The Americans,” “Perry Mason”) and is ONE°15 Brooklyn Marina’s official charter boat. (She can be booked by groups of up to six people for two-hour harbor tours.)