Jeff Bezos gave Lauren Sanchez what every billionaire’s girlfriend will now want

Now that Jeff Bezos has revealed that he decorated the prow of his new $500 million yacht with a sculpture of a “curvaceous winged goddess,” which bears a striking resemblance to his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez, it’s easy to imagine that the partners of other billionaires will also want their likenesses to be incorporated into the designs of their family mega-yachts.

As the Daily Mail first reported this week, Bezos and Sanchez were seen lounging on one of the decks of his enormous new yacht, Koru, as it was moored off the coast of the Spanish island Mallorca. The yacht is believed by many to be the largest sailing yacht in the world.

As paparazzi captured images of the Amazon founder shirtless, and Sanchez wearing a tiny pink bikini, they also snapped photos of the ship’s figurehead. It appears to be a highly visible gesture of Bezos’ love for the former TV personality, as well as his idea of a cool new status symbol that will be the envy of other billionaires.

Figurehead on Jeff Bezos’ extravagant yacht appears to be modelled on Lauren Sanchez https://t.co/h0FMIZPdqG pic.twitter.com/SJGShq0Sxe

— Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) May 18, 2023

Apparently carved from wood, this Sánchez-inspired figurehead wears a tank top and a necklace that features another symbol —  for Koru, which is Māori for loop or coil, People reported. The symbol has special meaning for the couple: It’s a spiral shape of an unfurling silver fern frond, and it represents new beginnings, as Bezos mentioned in a New Year’s Day Instagram post.

At the time, Bezos wrote that the new year is “a great time to take stock and focus on personal growth, renewal, rebirth, and paying careful attention to each moment of your life. The good and the bad. All of it. Celebrate and grow.”

For Bezos, Sanchez represents a major new beginning in his storied life as one of the world’s richest men who’s been transformed from “a monobrowed tech nerd with a receding hairline,” as the Daily Mail once said, into “a buff Vin Diesel-lookalike.”

Jeff Bezos bares his muscles with girlfriend Lauren Sanchez as they relax on his $500M love boat https://t.co/RfUB9NDPpB pic.twitter.com/Rw9MotfpYZ

— Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) May 17, 2023

This transformation seems to have begun with his love affair with Sanchez, which ended both their marriages in 2019. That January, Bezos and Sanchez’s secret romance was infamously exposed by the National Enquirer, which published a series of intimate text messages he sent her. One text read: “I love you, alive girl. I will show you with my body, and my lips and my eyes, very soon.”

Shortly before the National Enquirer published its story about the affair, Bezos and his then-wife Mackenzie Scott released a statement saying they planned to divorce after 25 years of marriage. They also described their split as amicable, with Scott walking away with a $35.6 billion settlement.  Meanwhile, Sanchez divorced Hollywood super agent Patrick Whitesell.

Since then, Bezos and Sanchez have been “joined at the hip,” Page Six said, as they’ve enjoyed lavish vacations, attended gala parties and dinners and hung out with celebrity friends. Before finding their way to Bezos’ new yacht, they were spotted at the F1 Miami Grand Prix and hit the Coachella music festival, where they were seen dancing during Bad Bunny’s set, People said.

Over the past several years, Bezos also has been overseeing the construction of his ship Koru, wanting to make sure that its design includes very tall masts, a swimming pool, a helipad, and room for a second, smaller yacht, the Cut reported. 

Jeff Bezos’s astonishing $500million love boat dominates the water off Spain https://t.co/GRZLaSCBa2 pic.twitter.com/2EC8FSNiIT

— Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) May 18, 2023

The ship was built in the historic port of Zwijndrecht, close to Rotterham in the Netherlands. Unfortunately, the tall masts sparked international controversy when Rotterdam announced that the middle section of its 100-year-old Koningshaven Bridge would have to be removed so the mega-yacht could make its way into the North Sea, the Daily Mail said.

Furious locals launched a petition and threatened to pelt the ship with rotten eggs, while Bezos offered to pay to have the bridge dismantled and rebuilt again, the Daily Mail said. In the end, Rotterdam’s mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb said the masts would have to be mounted downstream from the bridge. The Koru underwent sea trials in February and was handed over to Bezos last month after it sailed from the Netherlands to Mallorca, via Gibraltar.

There’s no word on when Bezos got the idea to create a figurehead to celebrate his love for his “alive girl.” But figureheads have been gracing ships for thousands of years, mostly for symbolic reasons, as they have no practical purpose. Goddess and queens, from Nike to Queen Victoria, have been popular inspirations, according to Daily Art magazine.

The Cut also said that ship owners have turned to designs of mermaids, fierce animals and Valkyrie to symbolize protection.  Bezos probably figured that Sanchez, an enthusiastic helicopter pilot, belonged in this protective class. It’s also like that Bezos’ gesture will inspire other billionaires to want to do the same for their girlfriends, wives, boyfriends or husbands, allowing a thousands-year-old art to become cool again.