TWA Flight Center

These days flying seems as mundane as taking the bus, unless you find a TSA pat-down exciting, of course. Gone is the glamour of the 1960s when air travel resembled a pleasure cruise, complete with lit cigarettes and sexy stewardesses, hot meals and ample legroom. No building evokes that time quite like Eero Saarinen’s TWA Terminal, which has been hailed as an architectural masterpiece, and one of the most beautiful airports in the world. It’s also one of the least accessible landmarked buildings in New York, but I got a glimpse inside when it opened briefly to the public during Open House New York last year.

The terminal, which opened at John F. Kennedy International Airport in 1962 (when it was still known as Idlewild Airport), was constructed to resemble a bird with outstretched wings. Today it can be reached through Terminal 5 by two long tubes, trippy corridors that used to lead to planes, but now seem to tunnel back through time. Stepping out of the tubes and into the terminal feels like walking into a modern cathedral, with the information desk as the high altar. A vaulted, concrete ceiling reflects natural light like the underside of a seashell. Skylight trails streak up the walls, and wide banks of windows rise at oblique angles, like the sides of a turning plane.

Upper-floor ramps curve into staircases, which wind down onto a main concourse studded with millions of tiny white tiles. A sunken seating area pops against the white floor like a vermillion pool. Every surface implies continuous motion, and right angles and dead ends are verboten. “We wanted passengers passing through the building to experience a fully-designed environment, in which each part arises from another and everything belongs to the same formal world,” Saarinen said of the building in 1959.

It’s charmingly retro, but also inspired and cool in the vein of contemporary Apple stores. We explore the entire terminal, getting a bit giddy over the details: Eames loveseats and a Noguchi fountain in the upstairs Ambassador Lounge, an interior dressing area eyeballed by wild, gold-domed lights, and the orange booths and mirrored panels in the Constellation Club, which resembles the set of a Lynchian dream.

Eames Loveseats in the Ambassador Lounge

Interior “eyeball” light

The Commodore Club

The Commodore Club

We knew it might be our last visit for a while. The building has been closed since 2001, when TWA merged with American Airlines. Increasing flight traffic and changing security concerns after 9/11 rendered the terminal impractical. In addition, Terminal 5, which opened as Jet Blue’s departure point in 2008, nearly encircles the structure, cutting off access to the rest of the airport and causing it to resemble a bird being swallowed rather than taking off. The windowed walls that once looked out onto departing and arriving planes now gaze onto a bleak interior lot.

But there is hope that the building reopen. The Port Authority has undertaken a $19 million restoration and is in talks with developers about constructing a boutique hotel behind the site, with the terminal acting as a lobby. If they move forward the plans would give the beloved building a new life, even if this time, it’s one that’s firmly tethered to earth.