Customization and Collaboration in Cabin Design
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Today’s session on guest-centric customization and creating differentiated brand experiences at the Passenger Experience Conference in Hamburg showed delegates how Etihad Airways’ creation of the stunning new A380 and B787 cabins fostered a most unusual collaborative effort.
Etihad’s latest long-haul cabins have garnered no shortage of press and are customized from nose-to-tail. From galleys with split tops and bottoms for a view right through, to the extravagant “Residences” occupying the A380’s upper-deck, the job took more than six years to complete.
The scale of the project was such that no single design firm was capable of delivering the final product Etihad envisioned. In the end, not one, or even two, but three competing design firms were asked to set aside their rivalries and work together for the greater good of the cabin, the Etihad brand and ultimately, the passenger.
“We pulled together a series of insights that helped us define a brief,” explained Calum Laming, vice-president of Guest Experience at Etihad Airways. “And also to develop a strategic platform, a core vision for all of the team to work to so we could be united under that vision and develop a creative strategy to bring that alive.”
Honour Branding, a group delivering brand experiences for the aviation and hospitality sectors, became the central point of contact between Etihad and the three design teams. Honour’s big challenge was to act as the glue holding its own team and the other two design firms together, ensuring that all were constantly working toward the same vision.
“For us, the beauty of this project was being able to work holistically across the whole cabin,” explained Michael Crump, Product and Innovation director at Honour Branding. “Very often as designer you’re brought in to help launch a business class or a first class. Not very often are you asked to design a whole A380 and asked to question every aspect of it. As designers we were able to question locations of specific aspects of the cabin, like where first class could be, were business class could be, and how we want to orientate galleys.”
Aside from Honour Branding, Acumen Associates (an experienced UK-based consultancy in transport interior design) was in charge of seating. Factory Design, another UK-based organization with an extensive list of clients in aviation, took up the challenge of general cabin design, galleys, lavatories and other shared spaces.
All three design groups expressed an exceptional level of pride in the final result of the long and challenging Etihad project. Additionally, they all agreed that an open and collaborative approach to the project was the key to getting it done.
“The only way to successfully achieve something new, something that looks good on paper and in a couple of years actually flies, is collaboration. It’s the essential ingredient of customization,” said Adam White, creative director at Factorydesign. “The designer sits between the airline, the aircraft maker and the supplier of any piece of cabin equipment. We bring together all things learned about the brand, the passenger experience and the technical issues. When collaboration falls over we’re left with failure.”
Etihad Airways’ A380 Upper Deck is one of the three finalists in the Premium Class and VIP category for the Crystal Cabin Awards that will be presented tomorrow.
Conference photos by Maxim Sergienko