American Airlines has revealed exciting new interiors for its Airbus A321XLR and Boeing 787-9 aircraft, due for delivery from 2024. The headline development is the Flagship Suite, a seat that sits somewhere between the airline’s current Flagship Business class and Flagship First in terms of luxury and experience, with a privacy door, a ‘chaise longue’ relaxed seating option and more personal storage space.
The B787-9 Flagship Suite is based on Adient Aerospace’s Ascent platform, optimised for Boeing cabins, customised in conjunction with Teague, and trimmed in fabrics from Tapis. For the narrowbody A321XLRs it has been suggested that the Collins Aurora seat has been chosen.
The new long-haul cabins will have more premium seating installed than on their current counterparts – indeed 45% more – with the B787-9s due to be fitted with 51 Flagship Suites seats and 32 premium economy seats. The Airbus A321XLR aircraft will feature 20 Flagship Suites and 12 premium economy seats.
Those Premium Economy seats are also new, and custom-designed for more privacy than the current model, with double the amount of in-seat storage space. The model? Customisation makes it difficult to say, but it appears to have much in common with the ZIMprivacy model.
Retrofits too
American also intends to retrofit its Boeing 777-300ER fleet with Flagship Suites. These 20 aircraft will be refreshed with the new interior schemes starting in late 2024, to include 70 Flagship Suite seats and 44 Premium Economy seats.
American will also retrofit its Airbus A321T fleet with new cabins, to align those 16 aircraft with the rest of its A321 fleet. American will continue to offer lie-flat seats on its transcontinental routes departing New York and Boston along with its Northeast Alliance partner, JetBlue Airways.
“We are enhancing the customer experience across their entire journey with American,” said Julie Rath, American’s VP of customer experience. “The arrival of new long-haul aircraft and the customised seat design of the Flagship Suite seats will offer customers a truly private premium experience on our long-haul fleet.”
