The biggest and most absurd ship in history is about to set sail. On January 27, cruise giant Royal Caribbean is launching the first voyage of the Icon of the Seas, its newest cruise ship, and the largest to ever lumber out into the open ocean.

The stats alone explain the bombastic ambition: 1,198 feet long; 250,800 tons; room for more than 5,610 guests in 2,805 state rooms; 2,350 crew; 20 decks, seven pools, including the largest on a boat; six waterslides, including the tallest on a boat; a swim-up bar; an ice skating rink; a three-level family townhouse with a built-in slide; and a three-story glass facade right in the most sensitive part of the ship’s structure.

The superlatives and over-the-top amenities may hint at the desperation the cruise industry faced during the lockdowns of the pandemic. But with a post-pandemic rebound that’s led to record-high bookings, the industry is now basking in what some have called “peak cruise.” Icon of the Seas, launching its first voyage from Miami to the Caribbean, is cashing in on that pent-up demand. The design behind this behemoth—a bit gaudy, a bit tacky, a lot boozy—may also be pushing the industry in new directions.

Royal Caribbean’s chill and thrill strategy

“We’re a brand that believes in chill and thrill,” says Jay Schneider, chief information officer at Royal Caribbean. The design of the ship was intended to optimize these two corporate goals, and was based largely on customer research and direct input. Data on the ways people use, enjoy, or bemoan cruise ships helped Royal Caribbean rethink some of the standard ways the ships in its 65-strong fleet have previously been designed.

“The pandemic really strengthened our conviction around those things in that the role of vacations has become that much more important to people,” says Kara Wallace, the company’s chief marketing officer.

On the chill side of the corporate strategy, customer feedback has guided Royal Caribbean in designing more water access into Icon of the Seas, whether through bigger glass facades, better views in rooms, or additional pools. Schneider says the ship has 62% more water than the company’s last class of ships. That’s made it easier to create different kinds of water experiences, such as the family-oriented “neighborhood” Surfside, which puts a kid-centric pool within clear view of an adults-only pool that also serves drinks. Swim & Tonic is Royal Caribbean’s first swim-up bar, and Schneider says the next iterations of Icon of the Seas, which are now in development, will make them even bigger.  

As a family-oriented cruise line, thrills are also essential, and part of the way Royal Caribbean competes in the amenities arms race of the cruise ship industry. Water slides and pools are givens in today’s cruise ships, and the team decided early on to design an industry-leading number of slides. Typically these would be scattered around a ship’s decks, but as the design evolved, they began moving closer and closer to one another as well as the other thrill-focused amenities on the ship, like its rock climbing wall, basketball court, and mini golf course. “We had this a-ha moment that we created an island of thrill. So we decided to call it Thrill Island,” Schneider says.

The centerpiece is the six-slide waterpark, which features a family raft-based waterslide that careens over the side of the ship and a 55-foot tall open free fall slide, which Royal Caribbean says is the tallest at sea.

Rethinking cruise ship clichés

It has become common in the industry for the requisite waterslide on board to have a moment where the acrylic tube of the slide is made transparent as it cuts through a non-water part of the ship. People walking down a deck or sitting in a lounge may suddenly see a person barrel through a tube overhead. It’s a cute idea, but Schneider says its time is over.

“We had this debate internally: Is the acrylic for the viewer or for the rider?” he says. In the spirit of thrill, the rider won out. “We said, ‘No, we’re not going to do that this time. I don’t care if the viewer sees your butt slide through the water. What I care about is that the acrylic is in the place that will maximize your screamability.’”

Instead of clear tubes giving passerby glimpses of waterslide riders , the clear sections of the waterslide are now placed in areas that are intended to surprise riders, such as right in a section that bends over the edge of the ship. “Thrill,” Schneider says, “is maximized.”

Other design elements rethink convention to take a similar passenger-first stance. One major, but often overlooked, part of the cruise experience is the initial boarding—a chaotic crush of people and their bags all trying to funnel through the same central space in the ship on the way to their rooms. “We’ve heard over the years that you don’t necessarily feel like you’re on vacation your first day on a cruise,” Schneider says. “From a ship design perspective, cruise ships tend to dump you out where it’s most convenient operationally to get you close to the elevator.” The resulting first steps onto a ship can be like walking through a windowless line at airport customs.

Icon of the Seas was designed to make this entrance experience more grand, with passengers entering into the ship’s main promenade and facing a three-story high wall of windows looking out to the ocean. On a typical cruise ship, this would be a wall of steel, and for good reason. “One of the sensitive parts about the structure of the ship is the center,” says Schneider. “To be able to pull off this tall expanse of a glass facade, we actually had to move the superstructure of the ship inward.”

The solution is a 52-foot-tall orb of steel that becomes the main support structure of the ship’s center. The ship’s designers used the spherical form to shift the ship’s loads while also creating a showpiece staircase and art installation they’ve dubbed the Pearl.

Rooms were also redesigned to account for guest experiences and expectations, and Royal Caribbean used design charrettes with customers to test out potential room configurations during design. Beds were reoriented to optimize water views, closets and storage space were reconfigured, and even the showers were updated with benches and rails to make it easier, for example, for someone to shave their legs.

Chill? Perhaps. Thrill? Maybe to some. Either way, the overall design builds on the standard cruise ship offerings with features and touches—some subtle, some very extravagant—that are geared towards making the cruise experience better and different from what’s come before. Doing that in a supersized ship, with an almost unhinged level of glitz and flair, Icon of the Seas embraces the inherent silliness of vacationing on a boat with thousands of people.