Farnborough Airport's New Operations/Terminal Building Takes Off

The striking 4,000sq m wing shaped structure will be the operational and administrative centre of the business airport and also provide meeting and conference facilities for the executive travellers. Organised over three levels, it will form a landmark headquarters.

TAG’s customer experience is one of ‘comfort, quality and excellence’. Most passengers will never enter the building and instead will be escorted in their own cars directly to the waiting aircraft.

“The challenge with this building,” said Michael Dempsey, project architect, “was how to realise this efficient service yet create a visual and physical connection with TAG’s corporate building and enhance the customer experience.”

REID architecture has created a ‘theatre of aviation’, a grandstand with views of the dynamic activities of the airport yet maintaining a functionality and scale appropriate for the privacy often demanded by the client’s customers. Conceived as a single entity, the operations/terminal building will be a powerful form that will evoke a sense of flight and contribute to the overall experience.

“Our aim,” stated Matthew Bedward, Director at REID architecture, “has been to create a building, which does not read as a series of walls and roofs but as an object, enclosing layered space.”

The building’s three levels will have varying sized floor plates constructed in concrete to contribute to the thermal mass, with an air displacement system for ventilation. A lightweight metal skin envelops the spaces within punctuated by windows, which relate to the spatial planning of each of the floor plates.

The operations/terminal building completes the new airport, which already features award winning hangars and a landmark air traffic control tower also designed by REID architecture. Work is due to complete in 12 months.

For further information please contact:
Justin Farmer,
Press Officer

Tel: +44 (0)20 7297 5600

Website: www.reidarchitecture.com
Email: Justin.farmer@ra-lond.com