TURKU, Finland -- On a brisk October morning amid the clink of champagne glasses, Richard D. Fain took ownership of the $1.4-billion Oasis of the Seas on the southwest coast of this nation where shipbuilding is a proud tradition.

Hours later, onboard the gargantuan vessel docked at the sprawling STX Europe shipyard, an exuberant Fain, who is chairman and chief executive of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., led a Miami Herald reporter on a walk through one of seven themed ``neighborhoods.''

After a quick ride on a handcrafted carousel on the Boardwalk, Fain, dressed in pinstripes, showed off AquaTheater, a kidney-shaped pool in an amphitheater that will feature dazzling water ballet and high dive acts against an ocean backdrop.

``Up there is the 10-meter board,'' said the tall and imposing executive, who has been intimately involved in the design and construction of Oasis, the world's largest cruise ship. ``And that's the 17-meter board up there. We haven't said anyone would dive off of it -- but somebody already has.''

Miami-based Royal Caribbean is taking its own leap of faith with Oasis.

Imagine launching the world's largest, most expensive and most extravagant cruise ship ever during the cruise industry's worst-ever slump. Imagine borrowing heavily to pay for the ambitious project and lining up extraordinary assistance from the government of Finland to finance the deal in the midst of an historic credit crunch.

Then imagine a sister ship, Allure of the Seas -- now taking shape at the hands of thousands of STX designers, engineers and construction workers in the same Finnish yard -- scheduled to join Oasis in Port Everglades in just a year.

Allure will double Royal Caribbean's high-stakes bet that a dizzying array of activities and entertainment will sway first-time cruisers and cruise fans to pay a premium price for something truly over the top.

Fain and his crew at Royal Caribbean, the No. 2 cruise operator after Carnival Corp., dreamed up the groundbreaking project, code named Genesis, six years ago when the economy was full steam ahead. But for the first nine months of 2009, each berth at Royal Caribbean generated 16 percent less money per day than a year earlier. Its profits plunged 72 percent.

``We didn't anticipate she would be born in the down cycle, but we knew that she would operate in downturns,'' said Adam M. Goldstein, president and chief executive of Royal Caribbean International and Fain's top lieutenant.

He estimates the useful life of the ship at 30 to 40 years.

Oasis, by any measure, is a jaw-dropper. The gross tonnage (which measures not weight, but the volume of enclosed space) is 44-percent larger than the next biggest ships -- Royal's Freedom of the Seas and sister vessels. With 2,160 crew members, Oasis will carry 5,400 passengers at double occupancy, up to 6,300 passengers when extra beds are filled.

Even in Turku, a history-laden city on the Baltic Sea that traces its shipbuilding roots to the early 18th century, the Oasis invokes awe.

``It's not only the biggest but also the most modern and the most green,'' said Teppo Raitis, STX Europe's senior vice president and director of the shipyard, which has carved a niche in creating giant, complex vessels. ``The ship represents 1.7 million design hours. That's 1,000 man-years.''

TAKING A BOW

Oasis, known as NB-1363, is so tall she needs a retractable funnel, or smokestack, to duck under bridges such as the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York or the Great Belt Bridge in Denmark. She cleared it by a few feet on her trip to Fort Lauderdale.