At Sea with Doug Newman

This past Sunday, 25 November 2007, Cunard took delivery of the new 90,049 GT, 2,000-berth Queen Victoria at Fincantieri’s Marghera shipyard in Venice. This is the culmination of a process that began with the start of work on 14 April 2005 and continued with the keel laying on 19 May 2006 and float out on 15 January 2007.

Cunard president and managing director Carol Marlow and Carnival Corporation & plc chairman Micky Arison were on hand to accept delivery of the ship. Among the guests in attendance was Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, who was the head of state-owned Fincantieri’s then-parent IRI from 1982 to 1989, during which time the company began building cruise ships. (The first Fincantieri cruise ship was the original Crown Princess, now Ocean Village’s Ocean Village Two, delivered from the Monfalcone yard near Trieste in 1990. Ocean Village Two is part of the Carnival UK family along with Queen Victoria.)

The ship, now under the command of Captain Paul Wright, will leave the yard on 30 November and is scheduled to arrive in her home port of Southampton on 7 December. She will be named at Southampton on 10 December by HRH The Duchess of Cornwall before departing on her maiden voyage on 11 December.

The following is a series of photographs released by Cunard that give us the first real glimpse of the ship’s interiors, designed by Giacomo Mortola of GEM srl. This is Mr. Mortola’s first Cunarder, but he has previously done a great deal of work for sister company Princess Cruises.

From these photos, many areas of the interiors of Queen Victoria show a strong resemblance to Mr. Mortola’s Princess work, albeit with a strong “British ocean liner” theme reminiscent of Queen Mary 2. The overall decor is very different from that ship (whose interiors were mainly the work of Tillberg Design) and many elements like the frequent use of green, brown and neutral tones, the ceiling finishes, the layout of the seats in the Royal Court Theatre the marble flooring in the Grand Lobby and the carpet patterns should seem very familiar to Princess veterans. However, the overall effect is clearly a new one, making Queen Victoria distinct from both past Cunard and Princess ships.

While I would certainly have preferred a more modern interior design — I recall the “modern British liner” design theme specified for the original Queen Victoria (completed as Arcadia for sister company P&O Cruises) — Queen Victoria’s decor is clearly in line with image Cunard wishes to project and I imagine the ship will be quite a commercial success. However, I am hoping for a more modern design for the upcoming Queen Elizabeth! In the meantime, I look forward to boarding Queen Victoria as soon as possible to see her for myself.