Bahrain’s first floating hotel could open as early as October, with the $5m, 16-room C-Hotel to be docked at Coral Bay, in Manama. Billed as a five-star luxury offering, the Italian-designed project by businessman Akram Miknas’ Seven Leisure Group comprises 14, 20 square metre rooms plus two suites. It will be the second project for SLG in Coral Bay.

The $5 million project will include 14 rooms and two suites with balconies, which will be outfitted with Italian-made furnishings.

The project is the brainchild of the Seven Leisure Group, belonging to businessman Akram Miknas, which already owns Coral Bay. “About six months ago I decided to start this project so I bought a boat, which was a house boat, and converted it and took out the engines because the hotel will be a stationary docked boat,” he said.

“Working on an existing boat made things a lot easier. We gave the boat to a marine architect to design the new outlay and it took about three months of design work to get it right.”

He said all fixtures, furnishing and even the carpet had been custom designed in Italy for the project. Standard rooms cost an average of $300,000 per room to create.