New Zealand Commercial Design Trends Series NZ Commercial Design Trends Vol. 35/02C | Page 41

Previous pages:Return to
the golden age of travel – the
adaptive reuse of architect Eero
Saarinen’s TWA Flight Center
as lobby and dining facilities of
a luxury retro hotel evokes the
golden age of travel.
Facing page:The fluid lines of
the existing building are intended
to stand out crisply against the
clean, uncluttered, glass-fronted,
curving guest room wings.
Below:A refitted, and permanently
grounded, Lockheed Constellation
serves as a retro cocktail bar.
Back in 1962, when architect Eero Saarinen’s
fabulously futuristic TWA Flight Center was opened
at JFK International Airport, the world was getting
pretty darn excited about the golden age of travel. It
was true, the times were a-changin’ – in three years
a jet would be winging the Fab Four over to the
United States from Britain and there was even talk of
landing some lucky character on the moon.
In essence, the TWA Flight Center with its fluid,
impossible-looking architecture was something of
a Mid-century-Modern cathedral to aviation. And
the centre had another claim to fame, it was owned
briefly by billionaire eccentric Howard Hughes.
The building was designed with a thin four-shell
structure – a popular construction form at the time.
That aside, other architectural references pale as
Saarinen designed the iconic terminal very much on
its own terms. Unfortunately, the visionary architect
died a year before the terminal actually opened.
The TWA Flight Center served as TWA’s terminal
at JFK until 2001, when it was no longer able to
support modern aircraft. In 1994 it was designated
as a historic landmark and in 2005 it was listed on
the New York State Register of Historic Places.
And thus the scene is set for one of the most
amazing examples of adaptive reuse in modern
times. MCR – the seventh largest US hotel owner-
operator – together with Morse Development had
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