
TWA Hotel Inside Eero Saarinen's JFK Airport Terminal Open for Reservations - curtis
https://www.dezeen.com/2019/02/17/twa-hotel-eero-saarinen-jfk-airport-new-york-city/
======
crazygringo
I visited the terminal a few years ago as part of the Open House New York
weekend -- it's _amazing_ , simultaneously feels like you're time-traveling to
the past (an actual _Mad Men_ -era cocktail bar that hadn't been restored yet)
as well as the past's idea of the future (like you're on a _Star Trek_ set).
It was such an imaginative space, so earnestly futuristic without a trace of
irony or embarrassment.

Apparently Open House New York was instrumental in preventing the terminal
from being abolished -- once the public was able to see it for the first time,
there was then enough public pressure to keep it.

I find it strange that the photos in this article only show the terminal
itself (used as a lobby) and the inside of the hotel rooms, but not a single
photo of the exterior of the hotel towers.

Here's a gallery that gives a much better idea of the hotel itself, under
construction:

[https://ny.curbed.com/2018/3/26/17164804/twa-hotel-eero-
saar...](https://ny.curbed.com/2018/3/26/17164804/twa-hotel-eero-saarinen-jfk-
airport)

~~~
iguy
The main buildings are just big blocks, maybe nothing to show. But they must
contain all these restaurants etc, not just rooms -- so guests will probably
only walk through the lobby a few times. Have a drink there, I guess.

Still, it's really great that they kept the building. Super hard to imagine
this being the right scale for an airport, where would you put the endless
snaking queue for the x-ray machines?

~~~
ghaff
At the time that the terminal was being closed down, I mentioned it to someone
at my company who had been a higher-up at an airline (very post-TWA) which
used that terminal. His comment was basically that it was a really awful
terminal :-)

~~~
iguy
I had to check but it only closed in 2001, I'm sure it was really awful to use
by then! Never went there, but can confirm air travel was not very Mad Men by
that point.

~~~
ghaff
You throwing the date out there made me realize I was confused. I was a bit
surprised to read TWA when I was thinking that it was Pan Am's terminal. And,
indeed, that was the one I was thinking of and that one was actually
demolished a few years back. [1] It was also quite iconic.

I probably flew through there at some point. My dad used to travel
internationally on Pan Am all the time and he told me that that's where he
always got his hair cut.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worldport_(Pan_Am)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worldport_\(Pan_Am\))

~~~
bronco21016
The old Pan Am terminal was truly atrocious. There were tarps, hoses, and
buckets everywhere for the leaking roof. Also there was limited seating for
any of the gates because there of course had to be tons of Hudson News shops.
I’m definitely one to feel airline nostalgia but that place definitely needed
to go.

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drfuchs
The article doesn’t have a picture of one of the most striking features of the
TWA terminal: its iconic Tunnel to the gates. Walking through it really made
you feel like you were leaving one world and entering another, futuristic,
one.

Here’s one image that doesn’t quite do it justice — the bottom of
[http://edgeofthecityblog.blogspot.com/2015/04/jfk-twa-
termin...](http://edgeofthecityblog.blogspot.com/2015/04/jfk-twa-terminal-may-
finally-become.html)

~~~
chinathrow
Thanks for that reference, I was sure I've seen that tunnel somewhere before.
It was used in Catch me if you can.

[https://untappedcities.com/2013/11/19/film-locations-
leonard...](https://untappedcities.com/2013/11/19/film-locations-leonardo-
dicaprio-jfk-airport-twa-flight-center-terminal-catch-me-if-you-can/)

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arnon
I'm just happy the gorgeous building is being used again, not being
demolished.

~~~
saagarjha
Opened up the article to look at the pictures, and I have to say that they
exceeded my expectations. It’s a really nice looking building!

~~~
keithpeter
Good quality 1960s buildings made of concrete with stone flagging and wood
paneling inside are nice spaces. I always remember the feeling of light and
space in the 1960s blocks I worked in at University (1980s, buildings then 20
years old)

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Reason077
Hopefully they've got a good supply of that TWA-logo-embossed glasswear,
because those are definitely going to go missing.

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CaliforniaKarl
One picture shows a rotary phone on a side table. I really hope that is the
actual phone model that each room will have!

~~~
frutiger
The rooms at The Ned in London (a restored 1920s Bank, complete with a vault
turned into a cocktail bar) also has Bakelites as phones in every room.

~~~
B1FF_PSUVM
I suspect the TWA hotel ones are not bakelite telephones (cf. images from
[https://www.google.com/search?q=bakelite+telephone](https://www.google.com/search?q=bakelite+telephone)
).

The bakelite phones had some edges and were really heavy. The photo seems a
later 70s/80s model with a softer plastic shell that would not really hurt if
tossed at you. I think they had to weigh those down with some metal inside,

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nabla9
Eero Saarinen had amazing neo-futuristic style.

IBM, Thomas J. Watson Research Center is another example of his work with
similar style.

Sans the asbestos and lead paint these buildings are amazing.

~~~
ghaff
For anyone in the Boston/Cambridge area, there are a couple nice examples at
MIT as well. (Kresge Auditorium and the Chapel.) He also did the Gateway Arch
in St. Louis.

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curtis
It just occurred to me that the chairs are a very similar color to the chairs
in the space station Hilton in 2001 A Space Odyssey:

[https://filmandfurniture.com/wp-
content/uploads/2014/04/2001...](https://filmandfurniture.com/wp-
content/uploads/2014/04/2001-space-station-5-lobby.jpg)

~~~
jedberg
That was basically what everyone agreed the future would look like in the
1960s. :) In fact I seem to remember reading somewhere that Kubrick was
inspired by this terminal, but I can't find that now, so my mind may have made
that up.

~~~
curtis
I don't know if Kubrick ever traveled through the terminal since he apparently
had a serious fear of flying. It seems likely that some of the people involved
with the production of 2001 would have, though. And it would have been brand
new at the time.

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jhbadger
It's nice that this has been saved, but it is unfortunate that the arguably
more interesting Pan Am Worldport wasn't.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worldport_(Pan_Am)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worldport_\(Pan_Am\))

