Harri Kulovaara, executive vice-president maritime at Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd, told TTG: “This project started five years ago from just plain paper, but a number of elements were added quite late to the project, such as iFly and North Star, which we started work on around two years ago,” he explained.
He also admitted that it took a while to convince him that the much heralded 270 lounge could be built. “I was not 100% sure in the beginning that we would be able to pull it all together.
“It’s the most complex room we have ever built – the structure of it was challenging because of its position at the stern of the ships, over the propellers, and we wanted a large space that was pillar free.”
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Meanwhile Kulovaara revealed that the idea for the SeaPlex area, which includes the dodgems, roller skating arena and circus training area, had been an idea the line had been wanting to introduce to a ship for more than 10 years.
“We wanted an enclosed area that could work in multiple layers but the actual area we produced surprised me – it went beyond what we thought we could do, with all those toys and activities.”
He added that the ship took a total of between six and seven million working hours to build, with hundreds of designers in up to 50 different locations.
