Viking Venus: Nordic beauty built to be green

With a 30-year career spanning prestigious hotel projects for companies including Ritz-Carlton, Four Seasons and Langham Hospitality Group, Richard Riveire did not envisage a time when he would be taking a keen interest in knitting patterns, let alone spearheading Viking chairman Torstein Hagen’s vision for the line’s interior design.

It marked an unexpected first for the founding principal at the Los Angeles office of international architecture and design firm Rottet Studio, who tells Passenger Ship Technology, “When I first met Tor, I said he should understand that I had never been on a cruise in my life, but he said that’s why he wanted to have me.”

Coming into cruise ship design with a completely different mindset and no preconceptions about what could or could not be achieved enabled Mr Riveire to shape Viking’s distinctive interiors. His collaboration began with the Longship river fleet and has continued since Viking entered the ocean cruise market as a start-up with the launch of Viking Star in 2015.

Now working on Viking Venus, the seventh cruise ship built for Viking by Fincantieri and set to debut in 2021, he says “It was a great privilege for an architect to have the opportunity to set a brand and be given a clean slate. In the same way the hotel world is all about creating a story and crafting an experience for guests, Tor had a wonderful story to tell with the Norwegian approach to life and Scandinavian authenticity in general, which makes Viking Venus and the rest of the ships very personal.”

Floated out in June 2020 at the shipyard in Ancona, the ship’s gross tonnage is 47,800 tonnes, with an overall length of 228.2 m, beam of 28.8 m and draught of 6.45 m. In common with its sister ships, it has 465 cabins with accommodation for 930 passengers.

Mr Riveire says that behind the “simplicity and straightforwardness” of the design, which has become the trademark of Viking’s vessels, Viking Venus has a host of intricate design details for guests to discover.

“We don’t do a lot of entertainment architecture, so you won’t find any flashing lights and glitz. It is very clear it is a Viking ship. When you work on a hotel it is all about the place and you pull a story out of the location, but these ships go everywhere. The destination is the reason for passengers being there and when you have spent all day looking at amazing scenery or ancient ruins, which are very visual experiences, we want passengers to come back on board and feel as if they are returning home to a warm, welcoming and comfortable environment.

“It is a deliberate approach that everything is simple, straightforward and beautifully executed with a familiar feel that guests will immediately recognise if they have travelled on Longships or other Viking ocean ships. Why change it if it is working? Many of our guests have travelled with us multiple times and they appreciate the fact they don’t have to spend time finding their way around a ship that is completely different from the others.”

He explains the five basic concepts behind the design which can be found throughout the ship: Scandinavian and Nordic heritage, residential modernism, authentic crafts, nature and exploration. It was this remit that found him studying the history of Norwegian knitting, which dates back to the beginning of the 1600s and is most famously seen in sweaters and mittens from the Selbu region, with around 300 patterns attributed to the area.

Mr Riveire continues “Knitting is huge in Norway and I drew a lot of inspiration from a craft and culture museum in Oslo. A lot of patterns around the ship are based on knitting patterns, such as the lichen garden in the atrium and the etching on the glass handrail leading to the Explorers’ Lounge.

“A lot of effort has gone into surprising and delighting guests with smaller things where people can learn about something. For example, when you arrive in a resort it is all about the big wow on the first day, such as the ocean and beach. But the day after that and the day after that it is still beautiful but you have got used to it. On the ship we want things to be discoverable on day four, seven and even longer, with passengers finding things they had not seen or noticed before.”

These idiosyncratic details include cheeky Norwegian trolls peeking out at the back of the elevator shaft and the Viking god Odin’s pair of black ravens - Huginn and Muninn - keeping a watchful eye over things in the airy Wintergarden. Elsewhere, Scandinavian tradition can be found in the snow grotto in the spa and private sauna in the expansive 134.5-m2 owner’s suite.

Additionally, Viking has bucked conventional ship design by doing away with a reception desk, instead having individual tables in the airy atrium.

Mr Riveire continues, “We want to create a personal relationship with our guests. One of the amazing things about Viking is the crew, who are always smiling and happy to interact with passengers. Our goal moving forward is to not have any architectural barriers between guests and crew, such as big desks.”