Gazing at the exterior of Boston Logan Airport’s new Terminal E building is like taking a trip back in time to an era when going to the airport held the promise of glamor and whimsy. The building, which fully opened to the public earlier this fall, has the type of bold curve-and-swoop design that’s reminiscent of the Jet Age’s swankiest terminal: the old TWA building at New York-JFK.
That punchy exterior and specific red color were careful choices by architect Luis Vidal, who was inspired by the colors of the city’s sports teams, its historical red-brick buildings, the hues of Harvard and MIT, and its autumn foliage. “Boston has [the] red color embedded in its DNA,” Vidal says. “And not just any red, but a red color with undertones of yellow and orange.” To capture this fluctuation, the design team, which also included architecture firm AECOM, used a prismatic paint dubbed Boston Red that “subtly changes color depending on the light,” created by Vidal specifically for the project at Switzerland’s Monopol Colors Lab. (It’s also the first time prismatic paint has ever been used on an airport façade.)
But let’s dig into the travel hub’s history before fully celebrating the new touches. The original Terminal E first opened in the 1970s and long ago surpassed the 1.5 million annual passengers it was designed to handle. To put the cramped space into perspective, more than 6 million annual passengers routinely passed through pre-pandemic. The new terminal utilizes 70,000 square feet of the original building that was saved and renovated, bringing the facility’s total footprint to 390,000 square feet.
Beyond the sure-to-be-iconic exterior is a brand-new terminal space for passengers on international flights to enjoy. Core to the facility are four new gates for wide-body planes, bringing the total number of gates in the terminal to 16. And thanks to a flexible layout, there’s also an option to add six narrow-body gates in the future. The massive facility also houses an enhanced ticketing hall and international arrivals area, a new security checkpoint, inbound and outbound baggage systems, international and domestic departures and arrivals, an immigration hall, and a sweeping concession space.
The entirety of the new building was designed around the concept of efficiency for travelers and airport workers, according to Vidal. Every design element serves a function, “beginning with its shape, which flows in a curve following the sun path to maximize natural lighting for passenger’s emotional and thermal comfort yet opening strategically to the north side to avoid direct rays and sun glare,” says Vidal. “This shape also serves as an acoustic barrier that inherently protects the city.”
