JONATHAN QUINN BARNETT · FOUNDER
Thirty-eight years in, the tools have changed and the method has not. Every project still begins with my pencil, in conversation with the people who will live with the result. From my early work with Ron Holland and Jon Bannenberg to founding JQB Design in 1995, that first sketch has always been the moment the idea takes shape.
From there the work moves into SolidWorks and Rhino, where the studio's models are built to the millimetre for yards and naval architects, and rendered so an owner can walk the deck before a plate is cut. The technology makes the idea buildable. It does not make the idea. That comes from listening, from a lifetime of boats, homes and objects, and from a simple test: does it fit the human standing in front of it?
Experience · Creativity · Integrity
See one yacht, start to finish →DESIGN SERVICES · A PERSONAL PROCESS
Designed around you.
Whether starting from an established series or developing a custom yacht, the brief begins with how you want to live.
Originality lies in the decisions that give a yacht purpose and character—not simply in whether its hull comes from a mould. Craft becomes art when those decisions come together as a coherent whole, made for the people who will use it.
Design Studies
Explorer Concept
Octo II
Begin with a sketch
We begin with a conversation about how you want to live, travel and spend time aboard. Hand sketches explore the possibilities; your responses guide the next drawing. Every project starts with you.
Exterior design
A yacht’s profile should express its purpose and your personality. I develop proportions, deck spaces and exterior details from the first concept through design development, coordinating with the naval architects and shipyard.
“A $350 million, 100-metre-plus yacht’s only cargo… is her interior.”
Interiors for living
The general arrangement starts with your daily life: where you gather, find privacy, work and enjoy the view. I plan spaces, circulation and interiors as one design—not a collection of rooms fitted into a hull.
Details that matter
Furniture, lighting, materials and finishes shape how a space feels and works. Bespoke pieces and carefully considered details connect the interior and exterior, aboard a yacht or at home.
Refit & renewal
An existing yacht can begin a new chapter. I review a vessel before purchase or refit, explore changes to its spaces and appearance, and help define the design scope with the technical team.
Refits are where design either pays for itself or comes due. A space built right the first time survives a decade of salt and use; one that was not gets rebuilt at the owner’s expense. Thirty-eight years of yachts have taught me both outcomes, in detail.
“The only experts in this business are the people who know how not to do it. We have made every mistake one can imagine—and learned what works and what doesn’t.”
The evolution of the beach club — 158 m Octo II proposal
Everything learned on the 126 m Lürssen carried into this proposal. Recessing the dive-storage racks into the walls turns what is usually a cramped dive centre into an open-plan club, and makes the beach club the yacht’s main entrance from the tenders — guests step aboard here, not at a side door. The fendering around that aft door — the cushioned stand-offs that let tenders come alongside without touching the hull — is original JQB work.
Two pools sit side by side — a cold plunge and a 105 °F saltwater tub — with every finish chosen for a room that will be wet each day it is used.
Imagine a steel box full of hinges, hydraulic lines, wiring, switches and shower fittings. Put a hand-painted grand piano in the middle. Surround it with beautiful deck furniture, fabrics, cushions and cabinetry. Now imagine seawater washing through whenever a passing yacht or tender throws up a wake.
That’s the design challenge of a beach club. It has to feel like a beautiful room and survive like a piece of marine machinery. Knowing what won’t survive—and designing accordingly—is where experience saves the owner money.
From sketch to build
Approved ideas develop into detailed 2D drawings, 3D models and visual studies so you can understand the design before it is built. I provide design coordination and consultation through development and construction, working with the engineers and shipyard on the integration of structure, systems, equipment and interior details.
We employ bleeding-edge software to bring the designs and presentations to life for our clients, and to communicate the ideas to select naval architects and hydrodynamic engineers. Structural engineers and systems designers take our layouts, models and a complete interior glossary of construction details directly into their studies and shop-drawing packages.
Custom, semi-custom & production
My work for Horizon Yachts includes the GRP V-Series from 68 to 77 feet, and now the 80 EVO. Each of the 15 hulls now in service has been tailored to its individual buyer.
In the superyacht realm, clients often become closely involved in the design process and seek extensive customization. The scope depends on the project: some begin with an established platform; others allow a much broader design brief.
Homes & spaces ashore
The same attention to the individual carries into homes, residential interiors, commercial spaces, furniture and lighting. From the first layout to materials and final details, the parts are designed with the whole experience in mind.
A SAMPLE OF PROCESS
How MLR was created
One yacht, start to finish. MLR — 53 m, Delta Marine, 2019 — from the first marker sketch to the owner stepping aboard. Every project follows this road; the destinations differ.
1 · Sketches
It begins on paper. Skylounge, columns, bar, cabins — drawn by hand with the owner until the rooms feel right, before anyone is committed to anything.
2 · Sample boards
Materials come next: veneers, stone, leathers and fabrics laid out together, so every choice is judged against the whole palette rather than a swatch on its own.
3 · Colour elevation drawings and models (Ext/Int)
Colour renderings of each principal room fix the character of the interior before engineering begins; alongside them the studio’s SolidWorks and Rhino work — the exterior modelled to the millimetre and every cabinet detailed for the joiners. What the owner approves here is what gets built.
4 · Shop site visits and approvals with subs
Shop visits catch what a drawing cannot. Stone, joinery, metalwork and the loose furniture are reviewed and approved with each subcontractor where they are made, before anything goes aboard.
5 · Aboard
Delivered 2019. The rooms sketched in stage one, as the owner lives in them.