Door Decorating? Really?

[Marian Paroo]

Srsly?

 

I've been looking on other boards here, and it seems that a lot of people do it. They claim that they do it mostly because they are afraid they won't find their cabin otherwise.

 

I haven't door decorated since college, and that was in the previous century.

 

Do you guys (and gals) do it? Do you put up subtle hints?

 

Would this play on an MSC cruise or is it strictly American?

[soldham]

We do for Christmas Cruises only.

[Darrell6t]

We sometimes do it on all-gay cruises. But something simple and maybe funny. On the Allure we just had a nice photo of us both dressed in Hawaiian shirts. But some people go really crazy with their dooes. We have never decorated our door on an ordingary cruise. I can read numbers and don't need to use something else to locate the proper cabin.

[Hal San Diego]

:) We typically decorate our door on most cruises because we are usually celebrating something (anniversary, birthday, xmas, etc) and like the way it brightens up an otherwise boring corridor...on our recent holiday cruise, the stewards, head housekeeper and cruise director all loved the xmas wrap and big red bow...however the neighbors were not happy when they attempted to come back to their cabin three sheets to the wind on the final night and couldn't find their door because we had removed the wrapping on our door before dinner and they were totally lost with our landmark!!!

Hal San Diego:)

[Boytjie]

We always decorate on gay cruises; RSVP has a competition these days.

 

We did not decorate on the QM2... they would not have been amused. :)

[sfgoguy]

I love putting up simple door decorations on a gay cruise. I usually have something related to San Francisco and it almost always elicits friendly conversation from passersby. And, I enjoy seeing those cabin doors that are really decked-out - string lights, etc.

 

We are quite a creative bunch, if I do say so. :D

[Gunther1]

We set a budget of about $3-4 (not counting tax) at the local dollar store about a week before we leave. Usually involves some sort of wrapping paper and a bunch of sparkly bows. It's nice to see our "home" from 394 rooms away down that LONG hall :).

[Schplinky]

I've never done it. I don't have trouble findng the cabin. I might do it for a celebration, though.

[CruisinMaterial]

While I don't have trouble finding the cabin, I used to decorate on both gay and straight cruises. On the 2006 Caribbean Princess cruise I did a Pirates of the Caribbean theme on my stateroom door and the neighbors next door got all pissy and complained and well that ended my door decorating on straight cruises. Leave it to straight (elderly) people on Princess to be a bunch of party poopers!

 

On NCL since I am hardly ever in my cabin... I haven't decorated but I'm sure they wouldn't mind at all. Maybe I should on my upcoming Epic cruise... however, the hallways in the studios have their own decor (lighting specifically). :cool:

[Schplinky]

While I don't have trouble finding the cabin, I used to decorate on both gay and straight cruises. On the 2006 Caribbean Princess cruise I did a Pirates of the Caribbean theme on my stateroom door and the neighbors next door got all pissy and complained and well that ended my door decorating on straight cruises. Leave it to straight (elderly) people on Princess to be a bunch of party poopers!

 

On NCL since I am hardly ever in my cabin... I haven't decorated but I'm sure they wouldn't mind at all. Maybe I should on my upcoming Epic cruise... however, the hallways in the studios have their own decor (lighting specifically). :cool:

 

What on earth did they mind? You were having too much fun?

 

I've seen some pretty racy door designs online from gay charters but on mainstream cruises, it seems pretty harmless to have something fun up. I always seem to know where I am on a ship and the few times I ever do get turned around are weird for me.

[CruisinMaterial]

What on earth did they mind? You were having too much fun?

 

I couldn't figure it out either. The head of the Housekeeping Department came down and knocked on my door but I saw him in their cabin a few minutes prior and didn't think anything of it. I wouldn't have known who he was until he introduced himself and explained he'd received a complaint. Needless to say I knew where it came from. He had two stewards and himself arrange them in my cabin. LOL I had some pirate faces and a pirate ship. All of which were taped to the door using paper tape (which as you may know or may not know is very non-adhesive so it wouldn't leave any residual and is used for sensitive skin people). It just really made me annoyed that people are that bored during their cruise that they can complain about something so trivial.

 

If it were as racy as some of the door decorations I've seen on Atlantis then I could understand it but harmless pirate faces and a pirate ship are not worthy of complaining over! Sometimes I will never figure out my fellow straight cruisers beefs... this is just one of those times! :cool:

[fr8cub]

We have decorated our door for Christmas, and Princess did for our birthday. That is the only time we do it.

[COMBOY]

Srsly?

 

I've been looking on other boards here, and it seems that a lot of people do it. They claim that they do it mostly because they are afraid they won't find their cabin otherwise.

 

I haven't door decorated since college, and that was in the previous century.

 

Do you guys (and gals) do it? Do you put up subtle hints?

 

Would this play on an MSC cruise or is it strictly American?

 

Well, on most of my mainstream non-gay cruises I haven't seen too many doors decorated. You certainly could if you wanted too. Yes, it would be a great way to identify your cabin especially if you've had one too many....but this is the first time I'd heard people doing this for this purpose and I've been cruising since 1981. Now, on the all gays charters it's a whole different ball game. I would saw about 40-50% ish of the cabin doors - maybe more; maybe less. I've seen a whole hall decorated up with garland, flags, posters, you name it; I've seen it. The only caution I've seen is that it not be obstructive or offensive to the staff (naked men, etc) or they (Atlantis, RSVP) will remove it. However, I seen some pretty risque stuff. It's so fun to see what people come up with. Gay men can be so creative.

[MiamiSpartan]

We only decorate on the all gay cruises & it seems like 60-70% do it on those trips...

It's fun to see how creative people can get!

We usually do something simple:

Photos of us on previous trips, photos of our animals, large magnets representing Michigan State and U of Miami...

[twoontheisle]

Just a little sumtin sumtin like this always seems to break the ice with neighbors and passers by! We are always careful and respectful of the paint and finishes of the ship however.

[Blazerboy]

Never have, never will. I've over-indulged before, and still not needed that kind of help finding my stateroom. Never had a problem meeting people either. To me, it's like cars. I don't need to customize my car with a different paint job, or custom wheels, or color coordinated ribbons hanging from the rear view mirror. Even my personalized plate and HRC sticker seems too much sometimes. I pretty much trust that ship designers, like car designers, know the look they want, and accept it if I decide to purhase or not. One of the reazons I don't like NCL is that I've seen some of their interior decor. The ship designers know the atmosphere the ship wants for its cabin decks, so, other than rearranging the furniture in a few staterooms (I am gay, afterall), I pretty much leave things as they were.

 

Andrew

[Kenito]

Of course Halloween is a great door-decorating time. We participated and saw a lot of others who did the same thing.

 

I don't have a real problem finding my room, but I think a door deco makes it a more simple task, and actually has led to fellow passengers saying hello.

 

For our last cruise I arranged for group door magnets, only to find out when aboard that the doors now had a new surface to which the magnet was useless. Wasted my money. We'd been on the same ship the year before and the magnets worked great, but oh well.

 

So I scrap the magnet idea, which was easy to put up and remove with no residue at all, and if I want to door deco for our group in the future I'll have to buy tape.

[Bloom9]

Decorating on the Atlantis charters is popular, some go all out and decorate the surrounding wall areas, some are quite creative and fun to see, quite a bit of balcony decorations as well especially with the interior balconies

[apollobeach]

We have sailed over Easter on two occasions and decorated our cabin door.

[Lipz]

I've never done it (heck I've only been on two cruises and consider myself a newbie), but I've been thinking about it for this upcoming trip. Mainly because we are getting married on the ship and have a few guest cruising with us.

Any suggestions?

[cruzeluver]

Nope. Don't decorate hotel room doors either.

[apollobeach]

On some lines, packages can be purchased which include room and/or door decorations for special occasions.:)

[Buddy604]

On occasion, I've either used Vistaprint to print what they sell as a small car door magnet, or printed onto 8.5X11 inkjet magnetic sheets to create a subtle but fun door sign. If I'm traveling with friends, I like to leave a white box in the design and add a magnetic dry erase marker to the door for note leaving.

 

Some lines I've heard get stuffy and cite potential fire hazards given the amount of loose paper. I've never decorated on the QE2 or the QM2 - as others have said, on Cunard it "just isn't done." :D

[5:00_Somewhere]

Wow, I never knew this was such a hot topic. :p

 

We've done it only one time, and that was when Halloween happened to fall in the middle of the cruise. We taped one of those almost life sized articulated cardboard skeletons on the door (with a couple of bats, if memory serves.) Several people commented on it (positively). Even the cabin steward enjoyed it.

 

LOL! And I do have to confess that it did make it a little easier to find our cabin after that one rather raucous evening in the disco. :D

 

Other than that, no. Not because I have an issue with it, though - I figure, whatever people to do add to the fun is great.