A decade after airlines rushed to ditch first-class cabins in favour of new upgraded business-class suites , first is back in style. British Airways will soon unveil a new first-class suite on its Airbus A380 superjumbos and is creating new teams of dedicated first-class cabin crew. Emirates is spiffing up the first-class cabins on its A380s, which offer showers.
The seats are better upholstered and there are new pyjamas and slippers. Qantas has unveiled one of the most elegantly understated first-class cabins in the world. Etihad, the Abu Dhabi flag carrier, has resumed flying its A380, which offers the Residence, a 12-square-meter-room micro apartment with a lounge area, bathroom with shower, and double bed in the nose.
Yours for $10,700 for one passenger, or $17,600 for two, from London to Abu Dhabi (the airline no longer flies the A380 to Australia). Singapore Airlines offers double beds in its Suites class on its A380s. But one carrier outshines them all.
Qantas. The Australian flag carrier has unveiled the most exclusive, stylish and hi-tech airline cabin anywhere outside a private jet. At the Airbus factory in Toulouse, we got a sneak peek at the cabin that will be installed on Qantas’s ultra-long-haul Airbus A350 jets, which will soon start flying 21 hours non-stop from London and New York to Sydney and Melbourne.
There are six large enclosed suites, arranged in a 1-1-1 formation across the front of two rows of seats in the four-class jet. Each comes with a 0.6 metr.