During QE2’s 1990 refit a fifth main restaurant / third Grill Room, the Princess Grill II, was constructed in space formerly occupied by a Columbia Restaurant annexe on the starboard side of Quarter Deck directly opposite the existing Princess Grill. This was the fourth First-Class restaurant on board. A new staircase entrance to the Grill was built leading down from a new lounge built on Upper deck above.
Princess Grill II could accommodate 106 diners and was designed to be very similar in size, standard and atmosphere as the original Princess Grill on the port side. The new Grill was available for passengers to book from April 1991. The re-grading of certain cabins resulted in the introduction of D1 and D2 grade cabins and passengers in these two grades could select which Princess Grill they wished to dine in at the time of booking.
The existing Princess Grill became Princess Grill I.
The implications and confusion resulting from designating the Princess Grill I and II soon became apparent to Cunard:
• Despite the fact that those who booked a D grade (D1 or D2) cabin had the choice of which Princess Grill they could dine in, many of those booked in D1 grade thought they would be assigned to Princess Grill I while many of those in D2 grade thought their restaurant was automatically Princess Grill II.
• It was thought that the designation I and II implied that the original Grill (I) was better than the new one. This could have resulted in a negative effect on bookings for Columbia Restaurant cabins if passengers thought there were three levels of restaurant above them instead of two.
In 1991 the two Grills had their names amended:
Princess Grill I became Princess Grill Port
Princess Grill II became Princess Grill Starboard
All signage on board was changed to reflect the ‘new’ names and all brochures from 1992 included this change.
