The route to Zurich Airport’s new viewing terrace takes us up into the clouds – or so it seems when you walk along the 40-meter-long access corridor in Finger B. Printed onto 270 fixed panels, an airliner flies over a sea of clouds that flanks the visitor’s path to the left and the right.
Ten-centimeter-wide aluminum panels made Colt International, a renowned specialist in building services, building design and lamellar systems, provide the canvas for this display, which is upon closer inspection in fact divided into individual strips. The panels are mounted 31 centimeters apart from each other; their height varying between 2.1 and 2.5 meters to account for the corridor’s differences in floor level. If you stand in front of the panels at a 90-degree angle, they also open up a wide view of the apron and the airport grounds.
The graphics have been printed onto the panels according to the principle of anamorphosis meaning that the images appear dynamic as you walk by them.
The cloud theme is intended to awaken the visitor’s fascination with flight as well as providing a prelude to the installation awaiting them on the viewing terrace, where interactive media and exhibits offer lots of information on airport operations as well as general information on the theme of flight.
On the way back to the terminal, the panels form another image: graphic elements from the world of aviation such as apron markings, weather data and colossal speech bubbles with encoded messages from radio traffic messages “Zürich Tower Grüezi SWISS 39, established ILS 14,8 Miles” escort the visitor out of this world of experience and back into the terminal.
To the left and the right, ten-centimeter-wide metal panels by Colt International flank the access corridor to the visitor’s terrace at Zurich Airport, photos © Colt International | Stefano Schröter, Luzern
The graphic themes were applied to the aluminum panels using individual strips of film
The individual strips were each given a code so as not to confuse them when applying the print to the panels
The closer you get to the clouds, which are printed on the front of the panels, the more the image appears to dissolve
If you stand in front of the panels at a 90 degree angle, they open up a wide view of the apron
Graphic motifs from the field of aviation provide visitors with a prelude to the media installation on the airport’s viewing terrace
The reverse of the panels, which are also adorned with printed graphics, present motifs such as speech bubbles with radio traffic messages from the cockpit
There is a distance of 31 centimeters between the panels
Divided into 137 strips: airplane theme on the metal panels made by Colt International for Zurich Airport
