From the 1970's, the updated Friend Ship United livery.
The United Airlines voting booth is closed and a winning livery has been announced for United’s retro livery: the Friend Ship United Airlines livery. I am told that the retro livery will be put on an Airbus A320 and not on a Boeing 757 as previously reported. That’s too bad since my main argument against the Saul Bass livery (which I love dearly) is I have seen it on a Boeing 757, but I have never seen it on an Airbus A320. Plus, I think liveries just seem to look better on Boeing 757s than on the A320. Oh well, better than no retro livery.
It is unknown when the new livery will make its debut, but I am told it will be a part of United’s 85th birthday celebration, which would be in 2011 sometime. I would also assume United would be celebrating the union of two airlines into the new United. I hope that United will have their Airbus A320 in retro Friend Ship livery right next to Continental’s Boeing 737 in Blue Skyway livery (hint, hint United).
United asked their employees to vote on the retro livery they wanted to see and the Friend Ship livery won with about a third of the votes. I also conducted a United Airlines retro livery poll and 27% of the more than 1200 votes wanted to see the Saul Bass livery. For me, it was a win-win. I love airline liveries and especially enjoy retro liveries. Although not my first choice, I am very excited to see the new-old Friend Ship livery on an Airbus A320 soon.
Sterling Airlines Boeing 737-700 (OY-MRH)
Sterling Airlines was founded in 1962 and was based out of the Copenhagen airport. Originally called “Sterling Airways,” the name was changed to “Sterling Airlines” when it merged with Maersk Air in 2005. Maybe Sterling liked the idea that Maersk had Boeing 737’s that were almost all one color and wanted to do the same. But instead of using blue, Sterling went with red… lots of it. Although they did have a special blue livery that looks pretty good, but still had red winglets.
There would have been no mistaking this livery. A red fuselage, engine cowlings, winglets and tail. Some airplanes had the “Sterling.eu” and others had “Sterling.com” or “Sterling.dk” on the side of the aircraft. For me, it is a little bit too much and reminds me of Virgin Blue’s livery. That is not a good thing since I am not a huge fan of Virgin Blue’s livery; although I think I might like the old Sterling livery better.
Sterling was was able to grow to 1,600 employees, 29 aircraft and about 40 destinations, but it didn’t stop them from running into financial difficulties. In October 2008 they had to file bankruptcy and ceased all operations. Cimber Air made a deal to buy the name and branding, but not aircraft and changed their name to Cimber Sterling Airlines.
Thanks to David Brown (not me — common name) for pointing this one out.
Image: Martin Third
RA-85626 Donavia Tupolev Tu-154M
If you look at Donavia Airlines livery it might look a bit like Aeroflot’s. There is good reason, the airline is 100% owned by Aeroflot.
Donavia started in 1925 out of Rostov Airport and has a long history serving Russia. After the fall of the Soviety Union, The airline’s name was changed to Donavia and absorbed regional parts of Aeroflot Airlines. Then in 2000, Aeroflot bought 100% stake in the airline and was changed to Aeroflot-Don. Then in September, the name was changed back to Donavia.
Donavia currently runs a fleet of TU-154s, Boeing 737-400 and 737-500‘s. The airline flies in Russian, Europe, Egypt and western Asian countries.
Image: Danner Gyde
S7 Airbus A310 VP-BTJ
You aren’t going to miss this livery rolling the down the runway. OJSC Siberia Airlines (but just call her S7) was founded in 1992 and is based in Novosibirsk, Russia.
The airline’s old livery was just a bit drab. With only color on the tail, a white body and some red writing. No one can say the newer S7 livery is bland. The interior is just as festive, check out this photo of the interior of an S7 Airbus A310; almost makes your eyes hurt.
Although the green livery looks good on the Airbus A310, A320, Boeing 737 and Boeing 767 fleet they currently fly, I think it looks best on the classic Tupolev TU-154 that they stopped flying in 2008. The TU-154’s were still flown under the GloBus livery which flew tourist flights until 2009.
In 2007 S7 put in an order for 15 Boeing 787 Dreamliners (would have loved to see that livery on a 787), but they were canceled in 2009 by S7. Just this month S7 was added to the Oneworld alliance, sponsored by British Airways.
Image: Anatoliy Zhuravlev
There are a lot of you out there that aren’t too keen on United’s new combined livery with Continental. The more I keep seeing the new livery in photos the more I seem to like it. Not that long ago, I was able to view the new United livery in person at Boeing Field and I have to say it isn’t that bad. Although the new livery is growing on me, it can’t beat some of United’s liveries from the past. I have been hoping that United would be having a retro-livery themed plane and good news; they will.
I have been asking to see the Saul Bass United livery to make a comeback, but after viewing some of their other liveries on a Boeing 757, I am not too sure anymore. We already know what the Saul Bass United livery looks like on a Boeing 757, but we don’t know what the others would look like.
United employees are able to vote until the first week of December. The Boeing 757 will remain in the retro livery until it goes into paint again.
UPDATE (12/13/10): The winner has been announced, see which retro United livery won.
VOTE: Which would you choose? (If you are reading this from the Seattle PI, click here to vote directly on the blog)
[poll id=”3″]
1) Notice the three separate words for "United Air Lines." This livery is from the Boeing 247
2) This livery was used in DC-4's when the name was just "United."
3) United mainliner design from the 1950's and 60's.
4) From the 1970's, the updated Friend Ship United livery.
5) In 1974 the United Tulip was born with the Saul Bass livery.
