And you’ll want to pet them when you meet them. And snap a photo.
To make doing so even more fun, now through Christmas Eve PHX is making sure that can happen.
The airport is hosting a Holiday Petting Zone where travelers can stop by, pet a Navigator Buddy and take their photo with a pup in front of a holiday backdrop. The message: Happy Paw-lidays from PHX.
The Holiday Petting Zone is located in Terminal 4, pre-security near the Information Counter by the A Security Checkpoint.
“From hot pants and go-go boots to disposable paper dresses, the 1960s and 1970s were known for breaking fashion norms and traditions – even in the airline industry. Mid-century air travel had progressed into a posh experience and airlines built unique brand identities to set themselves apart. Each airline found new ways to attract passengers with amenities like onboard movies, gourmet meals, and glamorous flight attendants.“
This exhibition is put together by the Phoenix Airport Museum and includes eight flight attendant uniforms, historic photographs, and a variety of airline amenity objects.
If you are passing through Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, look for the Style in the Aisle exhibit in Terminal 4, level 2 near ticketing through October 2021.
In the meantime, we’ve got some images to share here.
Highlights of the exhibit include Hughes Airwest’s 1977 “sundance yellow” dress with matching bucket-style hat and an American Airlines plaid “Americana” uniform with a raccoon-fur cap. A Trans World Airlines (TWA) single-use, gold paper dress – part of the “Foreign Accents” collection – is also on display.
Airline amenities on display include fine china and themed cocktail swizzle sticks. There’s also a first-class menu featuring caviar and lobster, and an ashtray and lighter with airline logos.
Here is another installment of our new “5 Things We Love About…” series celebrating some of the services, amenities and features we love about airports around the world.
We’re keeping our list to just 5 cool things about each airport, but feel free to add any bonus features we overlooked in the comments section below.
Feel free, too, to nominate an airport for the series or sponsor an installment.
The collection includes nearly 900 artworks, 35 exhibition spaces in six buildings and the Phoenix Aviation Archive.
Look for the art in both terminals and at the Rental Car Center. There’s also a treat at the 44th Street PHX Sky Train Station, which is home to a restored vintage World War I aircraft, the SPAD XIII.
2. The PHX Navigator Buddies
PHX is one of a growing list of airports where teams of therapy dogs and their handlers regularly visit the terminals to hang out with travelers and help de-stress the journey. Here they’re called the PHX Navigator Buddies.
3. The Fitness Trail at PHX
The Sky Harbor Fitness Trail at PHX is located post-security in Terminal 4 and is measured out to just a little over one mile from Gate A30 to Gate D8.
The trail is part of FitPHX, a city of Phoenix initiative intended to help get Phoenix residents into better shape. In addition to getting some exercise, travelers who walk the trail are rewarded with views of the downtown Phoenix skyline, beautiful Camelback Mountain and more.
4. Animal relief areas at PHX
PHX goes all out with the pet relief areas for pups and has seven pre and post-security cute-as-a-puppy places where dogs can take care of business. There are even animal relief areas at the PHX Sky Train stations.
5. The souvenirs at PHX Airport
We’ve found some charming – and quirky – souvenirs in the shops at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. Here are just a few of our favorites.
5 Things We Love About Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (PHX) is part of an ongoing series here at StuckatTheAirport.com.
If you’d like to sponsor one of the installments, get in touch.
Denver International Airport has collection stations to gather spare change to help local homeless people.
Now, Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport has set up change receptacles in front of the security checkpoints in the terminals to collect money to provide support for traveling military service members helped by USO Arizona.
According to PHX officials, every year about 23,000 troops and their families visit the pre-security USO in Phoenix Sky Harbor’s Terminal 4, which offers a quiet place for members of the military and their families to go before their flights as well as a café, children’s play area, computer kiosks, a movie room, and gaming area.
Foot-forward selfies with the carpet are popular at PDX.
It’s usually a bit of an inconvenience, but not that big a deal, when an airport changes out the carpeting in the terminals.
But because the current carpet at Portland International Airport has become a social media sensation, all manner of media will be on hand Friday when construction crews begin removing the existing carpet at PDX and preparing the floor for the installation of 13 acres of new carpet—enough to cover nearly 10 football fields.
This is what the new PDX carpet will look like.
Here’s the story of the PDX carpet and a round-of of some quirky airport carpets found at other airports around the country that I put together for my “At the Airport” column on USA Today.
Installed in the late 1980s, the old PDX carpet sports a geometric pattern inspired by the airport’s intersecting north-south runways and was for years an ignored part of the airport décor.
But then Portland began celebrating its core weirdness, social media became the big thing, and the rug became a hip symbol of home celebrated on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and with souvenirs ranging from socks, caps and water bottles to T-shirts, mugs, tote bags and bike helmets.
Carpet-inspired art and ale followed: Nancy Wilkins’s 11-foot by 16-foot collage, made of pieces of PDX carpet and titled “Carpet Diem!” was recently installed at the airport and Oregon-based Rogue Ales & Spirits just introduced PDX Carpet IPA.
PDX isn’t the only airport to forgo tile, terrazzo or other hard flooring in favor of rugs more difficult to maintain, but worth a second look.
When it was time to order 10.5 acres of new carpeting for its three terminals, Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport looked for something that would hold up to high foot traffic and repeated cleaning, and be easily recycled when it came time for replacement.
In 2005, PHX got all that (at the cost of $34.66 per square yard) plus a cool, custom pattern that looks like an aircraft on a radar screen.
In the pedestrian walkway between Terminal A and the parking garage at Sacramento International Airport, travelers walk across the 150-foot-long “Flying Carpet” created by artist Seyed Alavi. Installed in 2005, the woven, woolen carpet portrays a digital, aerial image of about 50 miles of the Sacramento River and nearby farm fields and orchards.
Part of an “Art in Public Places” project, the commission for SMF’s Flying Carpet included a duplicate version of the rug that has been in storage.
There are no socks, caps, beer or other official souvenirs (yet) bearing the carpet patterns from Phoenix Sky Harbor or Sacramento International Airports, but visitors regularly post images of the carpets on social media.
With subtle musical notes and musical instruments throughout, the carpet at Nashville International Airport celebrates Music City.
Denver International Airport recently installed 42,000 square yards of new carpeting in Concourse B and 25,000 square yards of new carpeting in Concourse C, at a cost of $2.5 million and $1.7 million respectively. The pattern isn’t aviation-themed, but casually references rivers and streams (in the walking areas) and (in the seating areas) things passengers often see out the windows at DEN: rain and snow.
The pattern in the 33 acres of teal and white carpeting at Orlando International Airport is quite simple but, along with plenty of light, water and live landscaping, is in keeping with the goal of creating an environment that is comfortable, people-friendly.
Meanwhile, back at Portland International Airport, the old carpet will be gone, but not forgotten: a limited number of 1,000 square yard sections of the old carpet will be made available to winning applicants who will likely sell or give it away small bits of the carpet to others.
