10 Coolest Airline Tail Art
by Dave on 26/10/09 at 8:29 pm
Aircraft today are like flying billboards. How a commercial airline decides to brand themselves goes a long way to distinguishing themselves in an ever-increasingly competitive commercial market. Below we look at 10 of the coolest examples of airlines branding themselves through creative use of tail art.
1. Air India Express – Taj Mahal
Image by chaity
This low-cost subsidiary of Air India is based in Mumbai and mostly flies routes to the Middle East and South East Asia. Each plane features a different tail art image expressing a unique facet of Indian culture, tradition or history. Beautifully executed, these are works of art! The Taj Mahal is one of the most enduring images of India and therefore deserves to be top of our list.
2. Air India Express – Peacock
Image by Stuart Lawson
Here is another example of the stunning tail art that Air India Express features on the tail of their aircraft.
3. Air India Express – Oil Lamps
Image by 713 Avenue
One more image from the fleet of Air India Express. If only all airlines would take a page from their book!
4. Frontier Airlines – “Ozzy” the Orca
Image by Drewski2112
Frontier Airlines, a low-cost airline based out of Denver, Colorado was founded in 1994. They fly within the United States, Mexico and Costa Rica. Under the company slogan “A Whole Different Animal,” each of their planes depicts a different animal. This one has “Ozzy” the Orca Whale!
5. Frontier Airliines – “Hank” the Bobcat
Image by Drewski2112
“Hank” the Bobcat is another example of the amazing detail which goes into the animal paintings on their aircraft tails and makes Frontier Airlines stand out from their competitors.
6. Frontier Airlines – “Sebastian” the Hawk
Image by Razvan Socol
Wings spread as if he has just landed is “Sebastian” the Hawk – another one of the exceptional tail art pictures from Frontier Airlines.
7. Frontier Airlines – “Domino” the Fawn
Image by planephotoman
Isn’t she cute? Just like Bambi ready to take her first steps in the glade. “Domino” is our final example of Frontier Airlines nature art.
8. First Air
Image by caribb
First Air, a North American airline based out of Kanata, Ontario in Canada flies from Ottawa and Montreal into the North – Nunavut and Northwest Territories. This beautiful snowy white bird speaks of the frozen north where this charter airline flies to.
9. Alaska Airlines
Image by Makaristos
What is it about the airlines which service the North? They all seem to brand themselves with stylish tail art. Alaska Airlines, which flies out of Tacoma/Seattle Airport and services Portland, Los Angeles and Anchorage Alaska, has this smiling Eskimo as their tail image.
10. British Airways – Ethnic Livery
(Imagines by Wikipedia)
Sadly, tail art is not always appreciated as much as it should be. In 1997 British Airways introduced a new livery design to their fleet of aircraft. The Utopia, or world-art, tail fins explored imagery by international artists and inspired by the countries that BA flies to. These new images came under fire from those who didn’t think it appropriate that BA was turning away from its traditional imagery. Even Margaret Thatcher entered the fray when she covered the tail fin on a model 747 with her handkerchief and said “we fly the British flag, not these awful things.” They were eventually removed entirely in 2001. For fans of tail art, they were a colourful addition to the aircraft fleet and are sorely missed.
This was a guest post was written by Knight Hooson, a writer for Australian credit card comparison website that compares the best airline credit cards and rewards credit cards, helping to stretch your dollars as far as possible.
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alina_popescu
Oct 26th, 2009
Taj Mahal and Killer whales – 10 Coolest Airline Tail Art http://ow.ly/wGMm
FlyersView.com
Oct 26th, 2009
RT @AircrewBuzz: RT @AirlinePost 10 Cool Examples of Aircraft Tail Art http://bit.ly/1xwY03 #aviation #airlines
Kami Kovacs
Oct 26th, 2009
RT @AircrewBuzz @AirlinePost: Airline Tail Art. My favorite will always be Frontier. http://bit.ly/BfFNA
uberVU - social comments
Oct 26th, 2009
Social comments and analytics for this post…
This post was mentioned on Twitter by supernova17: RT @AirlinePost: 10 Cool Examples of Aircraft Tail Art http://bit.ly/1xwY03...
Jesse
Oct 26th, 2009
If only more airlines would get better designs!
Tina Di Cicco
Oct 27th, 2009
Aircrafts are the most fascinating billboards! These airlines did a great job communicating their brand identity and aspirations . Alaska and Frontier are my favorites, which I used as reference when I led the livery design for Viva Macau. Air India Express’ Taj Mahal is truly an art.
Britt Urbach
Oct 27th, 2009
RT @AirTreks 10 coolest pieces of airplane tail art. Frontier wins it for wildlife! http://bit.ly/4cnJ0r. My personal fav british airways
10 Cool Examples of Airplane Tail Art | Oddity Central - Collecting Oddities
Nov 2nd, 2009
[...] artistic way of attracting clients, by covering tails of their airplanes with gorgeous paintings. Airline Post has come up with a list of the ten coolest painted airplane tails in the [...]
Art McArtist
Nov 16th, 2009
Totally photoshopped!!
Benet Wilson
Nov 20th, 2009
From the Airline Post blog: cool airplane tail art: http://tinyurl.com/yjqk3rk
Benet Wilson
Nov 20th, 2009
From the Airline Post blog: cool airplane tail art: http://tinyurl.com/yjqk3rk
TransWorld
Nov 20th, 2009
RT @AvWeekBenet: From the Airline Post blog: cool airplane tail art: http://tinyurl.com/yjqk3rk
Airline Tail Art | Attuworld.com
Nov 23rd, 2009
[...] an ever-increasingly competitive commercial market. Today we look at 10 of the coolest examples of airlines branding themselves through creative use of tail art. No TweetBacks yet. (Be the first to Tweet this post) Similar [...]
Arun Srivastava
Nov 23rd, 2009
10 Examples of Airline Tail Art: http://bit.ly/8Qr8Rx #in
NedSnyder
Nov 24th, 2009
Coolest Airline Tail Art
http://www.airlinepost.com/offbeat-news/coolest-airline-tail-art.html
Pepamint83
Nov 25th, 2009
10 Coolest Airline Tail Art – http://www.airlinepost.com/offbeat-news/coolest-airline-tail-art.html
Freddy
Nov 25th, 2009
How are they photoshopped?! They are NOT!
Sofia A.
Dec 2nd, 2009
Arte em caudas de avião http://migre.me/d3V5
eddie
Dec 2nd, 2009
best ever, maiden’s ed force one
http://www.ironmaiden.com/index.php?categoryid=8&p2_articleid=808
Homepage Only Links 5 December 2009 | djmick: V2
Dec 5th, 2009
[...] Airline Tail Art [...]
johnsw
Jan 15th, 2010
10 Coolest Airline Tail Art http://bit.ly/5aMX4j
aimee whitcroft
Feb 4th, 2010
@idealogmag me too. have some tail art in the meantime… http://bit.ly/cO8jEb