Bermuda?s first new luxury hotel in more than 35 years is on course to open in mid-2008 and is being built using a steel frame manufactured almost 80 years ago.

The $100 million Tucker?s Point Hotel and Spa ? on the site of the former Castle Harbour Hotel ? has been financed in part by an $85 million loan from the Bank of Bermuda, the largest loan ever given by the bank.

Tourism Minister Ewart Brown was among guests invited to view progress on the five-star facility yesterday.

He said: ?Soon those people who often like to say there has been no new hotel development in Bermuda for the last 30 years will have to find something new to say.

?We are pleased to see that construction is already well advanced on this exceptional new hotel.?

The hotel ? which is costing $1 million per room and which will set guests back between $600 and $2,000 a night when complete ? is being built around the original frame of the Castle Harbour Hotel, which opened in 1931 and closed in 1999.

The steel was manufactured by Dorman Long, a firm from Teesside in the northeast of England, which also supplied the steel for the Sydney Harbour Bridge in Australia in the 1920s.

The new hotel will use the frame for four of the original nine storeys at Castle Harbour and there will be an extra floor added.

The frame was first erected in England before being dismantled and shipped to Bermuda.

Tucker?s Point Club President Ed Trippe told that it was economical to use the original shell.

?They don?t make steel like that any more,? he said.

?Our engineers came and said ?this is phenomenal quality?. It?s been tested and looked at in every way.?

Keith Claridge, vice-president of design and construction for Tucker?s Point, added: ?It?s good quality and it?s saved us quite a few million dollars worth of costs in construction and in time.?

The new Georgian-style hotel ? which forms the centrepiece of the Tucker?s Point Club resort and residential community and is being built by Somers Construction ? will have another feature linked to the past: a restored croquet court.

It will also house guest rooms ranging in size from 530 to 1,200 square feet with luxury bathrooms and terraces with views of Castle Harbour and Harrington Sound.

There will also be a 10,000 square foot spa, a 12,000 square foot yoga and tai chi lawn, a 5,000 square foot conference centre, two restaurants and two swimming pools.

Mr. Trippe said yesterday: ?We are very excited about the progress we have made with the hotel.

Construction began in earnest about six months ago. Prior to that we started renovating the steel. The infrastructure (work) has been going on for five or six years.?

Tucker?s Point Club is owned by Bermuda Properties, which purchased it in 1958 when it was still Castle Harbour.

The 200-acre site was leased to Marriott Hotels in the 1980s.

The hotel was closed in November, 1999 and the golf course was closed in 2000. The latter reopened in May, 2002 when the site was renamed Tucker?s Point Club.

Philip Butterfield, chief executive officer of the Bank of Bermuda, said the $85 million loan to Tucker?s Point was evidence of the bank?s extended capability since becoming part of HSBC last year.