The Legend RIVA SUPER FLORIDA

Launched in 1959, Nounours (“Teddy Bear”), was a Riva Super Florida hull No 341. Film director and Brigitte Bardot’s former husband, Roger Vadim, purchased the Riva & gifted it to to Brigitte Bardot for her to keep at her St Tropez, villa ‘La Madrague’, & would soon become a familiar sight, in the old harbour of St. Tropez.

The Florida, built from 1953 until the late 1960s, is the most successful of the mahogany Riva single-engine runabouts. In the late 1960s, Nounours was sold to a chef at the restaurant at the Port Grimaud Marina. Some 20 years later, it was offered for sale at an auction held at Napoleon’s Chateau de Fontainebleau, where it was acquired by a young Swiss-born Monaco resident and passionate Bardot fan. In 2005, the boat was sold again and subsequently completely restored, including a Mercruiser V-8 engine by Riva specialists at Sportmer in 2007. The craft was last sold at auction by RM Sotheby’s auction in Lake Como, Italy for €146,250

©Ferretti Group

Further images: Riva Aquarama, Riva Yachts 1950-1972