The luxury cruise wars heat up with the arrival of a swanky new ship from Silversea
It's been a heady two weeks for luxury cruise lovers.
First, on July 31, the much-beloved luxury line Crystal restarted operations under new owners. Just a day later, an all-new luxury line, Explora Journeys, launched its first sailing, and established luxury player Seabourn took delivery of an expedition ship. Now, luxury leader Silversea Cruises has unveiled what may be its swankiest ship ever.
The world's biggest luxury cruise line by number of ships on Monday morning began welcoming the first paying passengers to its new, 728-passenger Silver Nova — the 12th vessel in its fleet.
Built at the Meyer Werft shipyard in Papenburg, Germany, the 11-deck-high ship will depart late Monday from a port near Venice, Italy, on a seven-night inaugural voyage through the Adriatic Sea. The sailing will include calls in Slovenia, Croatia and Montenegro.
Silver Nova is the first of an all-new series of ships for Silversea — one that, notably, marks a turning point for the line when it comes to ship design.
Conceived after the line was purchased by the parent company of Royal Caribbean in 2018, it's bigger than its predecessors and features an all-new layout — one that makes it more open to the sea than any other luxury ship afloat.
The new openness is accomplished in great part due to a new asymmetrical design for the ship's public decks that reorients their key features toward the sides of the ship instead of the center. Whether you're floating in the ship's main pool or dining in its new open-air Marquee restaurant, you're looking out at the sea (or whatever destination the ship is visiting) like you've never been able to before.
Silver Nova's main pool, notably, isn't in the middle of the ship but is offset to the edge of its starboard side, and it's oriented to face outward to the sea. Nearly all the lounge chairs around the pool face the sea, too.
There's also no walkway running above the pool deck on the starboard side of the ship, which is unusual.
The net effect is to create an open vista to the sea off the starboard side of the ship for passengers lounging on the pool deck — something we haven't seen before in the luxury cruise space.
Related: The 5 best destinations you can visit on a Silversea ship
Silver Nova's asymmetrical design is also evident at two new food and beverage venues at the top of the vessel.
The first, Marquee, is an alfresco dining venue that is also off-center, with an orientation that offers commanding views of the sea off the port side of the ship. It's home to The Grill, a casual eatery by day that turns into Silversea's signature outdoor "hot rocks" dining venue at night. It also doubles as the ship's Spaccanapoli pizza outlet during the day.
The second new venue, The Dusk Bar, is an open-air sky bar at the back of the vessel that, like Marquee, has an orientation that skews to the port side of the ship.
Additional dining venues on board include versions of Silversea's main signature restaurant La Terrazza, French eatery La Dame, seafood eatery Atlantide and sushi outlet Kaiseki.
In addition to asymmetry in many areas, one thing that is particularly noticeable about Silver Nova is its spaciousness. At 54,700 tons, the ship is about 34% bigger than Silversea's last three new vessels — Silver Muse, Silver Moon and Silver Dawn. However, it only holds about 22% more passengers. That means the space available per passenger is significantly larger than past Silversea ships.
Silver Nova's top capacity of 728 passengers with every berth filled is just 132 passengers more than the earlier vessels.
The extra space on Silver Nova has allowed Silversea to expand the lineup of cabin categories that it offers on the ship with more large suites.
As is always the case with Silversea ships, every cabin on Silver Nova is a suite.
Silversea fans will find new premium aft suites on Silver Nova that include two massive 1,324-square-foot complexes called Otium Suites. Inspired by Silversea's new wellness program, Otium, the Otium Suites feature floor-to-ceiling windows in all living areas. Each has a sprawling 431-square-foot balcony area that is more spacious than any other on board.
Even the smallest cabins on Silver Nova measure at least 357 square feet, which is unusually large for an entry-level cruise ship cabin.
Silver Nova will initially sail in the Mediterranean before repositioning to the Caribbean for the coming winter. Fares start at $4,700 per person, including a flight credit, airport transfers and shore excursions, for a seven-night Caribbean sailing out of Miami.
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