mega yacht

More recently, over the last decade or two, there has been an increase in the number and popularity of large private luxury yachts, over 24 metres. Luxury yachts typically have no real home port as such although a yacht must be registered in a port of the country of which it fly the flag. (Many times the yacht will have never been to the port.) They are particularly bountiful in the Mediterranean in summer and the Caribbean Sea in winter. (Yachts that go back and forth between the Caribbean and Mediterranean in the winter and summer are said to be doing the Milk Run.) Yachts will dock in a port of choosing while the crew does maintenance work and waits for owners or guests to arrive. The vessels then will do short cruises with the owners and/or guests aboard. Typical destinations in Spain and the French and Italian Rivieras include Cannes, Antibes, St. Tropez, Monte Carlo, Portofino, Porto Cervo, Puerto Banus, Puerto Portals and Palma, Majorca, although increasingly luxury yachts are cruising in more remote areas of the world. Antigua is one of the main ports in the Windward Islands of the Caribbean and hosts a Charter Show at the beginning of the winter season.

With the rising demand for luxury yachts there has been a concomitant increase in the numbers of custom boat building companies andyacht charter brokers. Luxury boat building and yacht charter companies are predominantly based in the United States and Western Europebut are also increasingly found in New Zealand, Asia and Eastern Europe. European manufacturers such as Ferretti, Azimut, Azimut-Benetti,Feadship,Shonelle, Sunseeker and Lürssen dominate the very top end of the yacht building market.

mega yacht

More recently, over the last decade or two, there has been an increase in the number and popularity of large private luxury yachts, over 24 metres. Luxury yachts typically have no real home port as such although a yacht must be registered in a port of the country of which it fly the flag. (Many times the yacht will have never been to the port.) They are particularly bountiful in the Mediterranean in summer and the Caribbean Sea in winter. (Yachts that go back and forth between the Caribbean and Mediterranean in the winter and summer are said to be doing the Milk Run.) Yachts will dock in a port of choosing while the crew does maintenance work and waits for owners or guests to arrive. The vessels then will do short cruises with the owners and/or guests aboard. Typical destinations in Spain and the French and Italian Rivieras include Cannes, Antibes, St. Tropez, Monte Carlo, Portofino, Porto Cervo, Puerto Banus, Puerto Portals and Palma, Majorca, although increasingly luxury yachts are cruising in more remote areas of the world. Antigua is one of the main ports in the Windward Islands of the Caribbean and hosts a Charter Show at the beginning of the winter season.

With the rising demand for luxury yachts there has been a concomitant increase in the numbers of custom boat building companies andyacht charter brokers. Luxury boat building and yacht charter companies are predominantly based in the United States and Western Europebut are also increasingly found in New Zealand, Asia and Eastern Europe. European manufacturers such as Ferretti, Azimut, Azimut-Benetti,Feadship,Shonelle, Sunseeker and Lürssen dominate the very top end of the yacht building market.

palace

A palace is a grand residence, especially a royal residence or the home of a head of state or some other high-ranking dignitary, such as abishop or archbishop.^[1] The word itself is derived from the Latin name Palātium, for Palatine Hill, one of the seven hills in Rome.^[1] In many parts of Europe, the term is also applied to relatively large urban buildings built as the private mansions of the aristocracy. Many historic palaces are now put to other uses such as parliaments, museums, hotels or office buildings. The word is also sometimes used to describe a lavishly ornate building used for public entertainment or exhibitions.^[1]

gold

Gold (pronounced /ˈɡoʊld/) is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from Latin: aurum, "shining dawn", hence adjective, aureate) and an atomic number of 79. It has been a highly sought-after precious metal for coinage, jewelry, and other arts since the beginning of recorded history. The metal occurs as nuggets or grains in rocks, in veins and in alluvial deposits. Gold is dense, soft, shiny and the most malleable and ductile pure metal known. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Gold is one of the coinage metals and has served as a symbol of wealth and a store of value throughout history. Gold standards have provided a basis for monetary policies. It also has been linked to a variety of symbolisms and ideologies.

A total of 165,000 tonnes of gold have been mined in human history, as of 2009.^[1] This is roughly equivalent to 5.3 billion troy ounces or, in terms of volume, about 8,500 cubic meters, or a 20.4m cube.

Although primarily used as a store of value, gold has many modern industrial uses includingdentistry and electronics. Gold has traditionally found use because of its good resistance tooxidative corrosion and excellent quality as a conductor of electricity.

Chemically, gold is a transition metal and can form trivalent and univalent cations in solutions. Compared with other metals, pure gold is chemically least reactive, but it is attacked by aqua regia (a mixture of acids), forming chloroauric acid, but not by the individual acids, and by alkaline solutions of cyanide. Gold dissolves in mercury, forming amalgam alloys, but does not react with it. Gold is insoluble in nitric acid, which dissolves silver and base metals. This property is exploited in the gold refining technique known as "inquartation and parting". Nitric acid has long been used to confirm the presence of gold in items, and this is the origin of the colloquial term "acid test", referring to a gold standard test for genuine value.

master piece

Masterpiece (or chef d'œuvre) in modern usage refers to a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or to a work of outstanding creativity, skill or workmanship.

Originally, the term masterpiece referred to a piece of work produced by an apprentice orjourneyman aspiring to become a master craftsman in the old European guild system. His fitness to qualify for guild membership was judged partially by the Masterpiece, and if he was successful, it was retained by the guild. Great care was therefore taken to produce a fine piece in whatever the craft was, whether confectionery, painting, goldsmithing, knifemaking, or many other trades. TheRoyal Academy in London is one institution that has acquired a fine collection of "Diploma works" as a condition of acceptance.

Originally the paper which a student needs to present in order to gain the degree of Master of Artswas also such a "Masterpiece" - i.e. a fine piece of scholaraship, the particular craft in which the student sought to be admitted as a master craftsman.

The term probably derives from the Dutch "meesterstuk" (German: Meisterstück), and the form "masterstik" is recorded in English in 1579 (or in Scots, since this was from some Aberdeen guild regulations), whereas "masterpiece" is first found in 1605, already outside a guild context, in aBen Jonson play^[1].

Nowadays it is used for an exceptionally good piece of creative work^[2] or the best piece of work of a particular artist or craftsman^[3].

Examples include: Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, Michelangelo's David, Ludwig van Beethoven'sNinth Symphony, Shakespeare's Hamlet, Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, and Goethe's Faust.

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Porche

Porsche Automobil Holding SE, usually shortened to Porsche SE ([ˈpɔʁʃə]^[3]), a SocietasEuropaea or European Public Company, is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury high performance automobiles, which is majority-owned by the Piëch and Porsche families. Porsche SE is headquartered in Zuffenhausen, a city district of Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg.

Porsche SE has one main subsidiary – Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG (which stands for Doktor Ingenieur honoris causa Ferdinand Porsche Aktiengesellschaft), often shortened to Porsche AG, which is responsible for the actual production and manufacture of the Porsche automobile line. The company is also the majority shareholder in Volkswagen AG, the parent company of the Volkswagen Group, which includes (but is not limited to) the automotive marques Audi,Volkswagen, Bentley Motors, Bugatti Automobiles, Škoda, Lamborghini and SEAT.

Porche

Porsche Automobil Holding SE, usually shortened to Porsche SE ([ˈpɔʁʃə]^[3]), a SocietasEuropaea or European Public Company, is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury high performance automobiles, which is majority-owned by the Piëch and Porsche families. Porsche SE is headquartered in Zuffenhausen, a city district of Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg.

Porsche SE has one main subsidiary – Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG (which stands for Doktor Ingenieur honoris causa Ferdinand Porsche Aktiengesellschaft), often shortened to Porsche AG, which is responsible for the actual production and manufacture of the Porsche automobile line. The company is also the majority shareholder in Volkswagen AG, the parent company of the Volkswagen Group, which includes (but is not limited to) the automotive marques Audi,Volkswagen, Bentley Motors, Bugatti Automobiles, Škoda, Lamborghini and SEAT.

jewelry

Amber pendants

Jewellery art using computer aided design.

Jewellery (pronounced /ˈdʒuːəlri/ or /ˈdʒuːələri/) or jewelry (see American and British English spelling differences) is a form of personal adornment, manifesting itself as necklaces, rings,brooches, earrings and bracelets. Jewellery may be made from any material, usually gemstones,precious metals or shells. Factors affecting the choice of materials include cultural differences and the availability of the materials. Jewellery may be appreciated because of its material properties, its patterns or for meaningful symbols. Jewellery differs from other items of personal adornment in that it besides looking appealing, it often has no other purpose. Items such as belts and handbagsare considered to be accessories rather than jewellery.

The word jewellery is derived from the word jewel, which was Anglicised from the Old French "jouel" circa the 13th century.^[1] Further tracing leads back to the Latin word "jocale", meaning plaything. Jewellery is one of the oldest forms of body adornment; recently-found 100,000-year-old beads made from Nassarius shells are thought to be the oldest known jewellery.^[2]

Jewellery is sometimes regarded as a way of storing wealth and might also possess some minimal functionality, such as holding a garment together or keeping hair in place. It has from very early times been regarded as a form of personal adornment. The first pieces of jewellery were made from natural materials, such as bone, animal teeth, shell, wood and carved stone. Some jewellery throughout the ages may have specifically been as an indication of a social group. More exotic jewellery is often for wealthier people, with its rarity increasing its value. Due to its personal nature and its indication of social class, some cultures established traditions of burying the dead with their jewellery.

Jewellery has been made to adorn nearly every body part, from hairpins to toe rings and many more types of jewellery. While high-quality jewellery is made with gemstones and precious metals, such as silver or gold, there is also a growing demand for art jewellery where design and creativity is prized above material value. In addition, there is the less costly costume jewellery, made from lower value materials and mass-produced. Other variations include wire sculpture(wrap) jewellery, using anything from base metal wire with rock tumbled stone to precious metals and precious gemstones.

diamond

In mineralogy, diamond (from the ancient Greek αδάμας – adámas "unbreakable") is anallotrope of carbon, where the carbon atoms are arranged in a variation of the face-centered cubic crystal structure called a diamond lattice. Diamond is less stable than graphite, but the conversion rate from diamond to graphite is negligible at ambient conditions. Diamond is renowned as a material with superlative physical qualities, most of which originate from the strong covalent bonding between its atoms. In particular, diamond has the highest hardnessand thermal conductivity of any bulk material. Those properties determine the major industrial application of diamond in cutting and polishing tools.

Diamond has remarkable optical characteristics. Because of its extremely rigid lattice, it can be contaminated by very few types of impurities, such as boron and nitrogen. Combined with wide transparency, this results in the clear, colorless appearance of most natural diamonds. Small amounts of defects or impurities (about one per million of lattice atoms) color diamond blue (boron), yellow (nitrogen), brown (lattice defects), green, purple, pink, orange or red. Diamond also has relatively high optical dispersion, that is ability to disperse light of different colors, which results in its characteristic luster. Excellent optical and mechanical properties, combined with efficient marketing, make diamond the most popular gemstone.

Most natural diamonds are formed at high-pressure high-temperature conditions existing at depths of 140 to 190 kilometers (87 to 120 mi) in the Earth mantle. Carbon-containing minerals provide the carbon source, and the growth occurs over periods from 1 billion to 3.3 billion years (25% to 75% of the age of the Earth). Diamonds are brought close to the Earth surface through deep volcanic eruptions by a magma, which cools into igneous rocks known as kimberlitesand lamproites. Diamonds can also be produced synthetically in a high-pressure high-temperature process which approximately simulates the conditions in the Earth mantle. An alternative, and completely different growth technique is chemical vapor deposition (CVD). Several non-diamond materials, which include cubic zirconia and silicon carbide and are often called diamond simulants, resemble diamond in appearance and many properties. Specialgemological techniques have been specially developed to distinguish natural and synthetic diamonds and diamond simulants.