It strikes me how one of the world's biggest avition nations only has extremely ugly, old-fashioned airlines, design-wise: China.
Air China, China Eastern and China Southern have designs that look like they are straight out of a tacky 1970's children's book in North Korea. But also the second-tier airlines in China are very ugly, design-wise.
Why doesn't at least one airline manager in China start to recognize the value of a good design, that could set his airline apart?
On a side note: I think that SWISS, Air New Zealand and of course Star Flyer in Japan are extremely well designed airlines and that does make a difference!

Because that would be a needless waste of money as your success in China depends on how good your relations are with the communist party and government

The new China Eastern colour scheme looks so much worse than the old one.

It´s a totally subjective issue. They might look ugly to you. Have you wondered how they look like to people in China? I personally find Air China very pleasant, classic, vintage like. Hainan has a nice scheme to me. So does China Southern. But then again, this is my personal opinion on the look of some airline livery and nobody cares about it but me. You get what I mean?

scbriml wrote:

I assume you're talking about colour schemes? You do appreciate it's an entirely subjective matter? One man's ugly is another's classic.

But you've got to admit they're not modern. Still there is room for modern design in China. If you look at Xiamen Air for example, they're rather good looking. Not really special, but certainly not dull or old-fashioned. Besides, China Eastern and China Southern are in the process of updating their liveries. It was long overdue, but it's finally coming. Their new liveries are rather plain, mostly white, but it's a step in the right direction. That only leaves Air China with a very outdated livery.

Personally I'm not a fan of classic, but that's just my opinion. I'm happy the old bare metal livery on American Airlines is finally gone, it was one of the most outdated liveries on earth until it got replaced. The new livery is so much more modern, that's the reason I like it.

But not every modern livery is beautiful. Take Wizzair for example, the combination of hard pink and dark blue almost hurts the eyes. Their old livery was a bit more soft with curved lines that have been straightened in the new livery. Still I like Wizzair better than Air China. You just can't have cheatlines anymore, those days are long gone. Say what you want about Wizzair, but they are modern.

Beauty is not subjective. If you show 100 faces to 100 people, they will largely agree on what is pretty and what is not. The same is true for airlines.
I do think that "airline design" goes welll beyond "livery" and includes anything from lounge design, uniforms, on-board magazine, menue card etc....

I agree, Chinese airlines tend to have extremely ugly liveries. Air China, and China Eastern have nasty, liveries, and a service level to match. Hainan Airlines is tacky to me, a true tuhao airline. Another one is Spring Airlines which manged to make yellow and green colors look drab and depressing.

lightmac wrote:

Beauty is not subjective. If you show 100 faces to 100 people, they will largely agree on what is pretty and what is not.

Of course it's subjective. You cannot measure "beauty", it's entirely subjective.

What many westerners might consider a beautiful face might be considered ugly by someone living in the deepest Brazilian jungle. It's completely subjective.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

But you've got to admit they're not modern. Still there is room for modern design in China. If you look at Xiamen Air for example, they're rather good looking. Not really special, but certainly not dull or old-fashioned. Besides, China Eastern and China Southern are in the process of updating their liveries. It was long overdue, but it's finally coming. Their new liveries are rather plain, mostly white, but it's a step in the right direction. That only leaves Air China with a very outdated livery.

IMHO, as many will call Air China's livery classic as will call it outdated or ugly.

It's all about personal opinion.

It's gone now but Asiana's old livery was.... special to say the least.

Old-fashioned design doesn't make it ugly.

lightmac wrote:

Beauty is not subjective. If you show 100 faces to 100 people, they will largely agree on what is pretty and what is not. The same is true for airlines.
I do think that "airline design" goes welll beyond "livery" and includes anything from lounge design, uniforms, on-board magazine, menue card etc....

Nonsense. Beauty is a social construct. There is nothing objective about it.

If beauty was entirely subjective there would be no famous models/actresses/actors. While of course there are variations, the rules of proportion are true for everybody and thus beauty is largely consensual. It is true for airline design as well.
Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

lightmac wrote:

If beauty was entirely subjective there would be no famous models/actresses/actors. While of course there are variations, the rules of proportion are true for everybody and thus beauty is largely consensual. It is true for airline design as well.
Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

I don't agree, I think there's a difference between seeing people as beautiful and the colors painted on a plane. Many people may have the same general idea of what beautiful person may look like, but that doesn't mean it's the same with aircraft.

While the Chinese airlines may have less creative colors, I don't see what makes them so incredibly ugly.

Seems like just a Chinese airline bashing thread tbh, not unlike those AvB or United/Delta/AA bashing ones.

If you can't agree that beauty is an entirely subjective thing like many others said right here, then there's nothing more that I can say. I can even say Delta or Alaska's livery is horrible if I want, and then what? Will they change the livery because of my one-man opinion?

Michael

lightmac wrote:

If beauty was entirely subjective there would be no famous models/actresses/actors. While of course there are variations, the rules of proportion are true for everybody and thus beauty is largely consensual. It is true for airline design as well.
Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

I don't think you understand what subjectivity is. Or normative thinking, for that matter.

I think your question about liveries is loaded.

lightmac wrote:

If beauty was entirely subjective there would be no famous models/actresses/actors. While of course there are variations, the rules of proportion are true for everybody and thus beauty is largely consensual. It is true for airline design as well.
Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

What well designed stylish livery are you talking about ? Whatever it is, the chances are that there will be plenty of people who will think that it's boring, ugly, unimaginative, etc, etc, etc......

To me there are some disappoining liveries on Chinese airlines, bu they tend to be boring, not ugly as such. To me the Air China livery on the 748 is just about perfect, it suits the aircraft, but on others aircraft it is a bit bland. China Southern is an old school livery and will attract plenty of followers and detractors, it is subjective to the individual, always will be when it comes to looks, not matter what the subject is.

Asian countries have different graphic design standards. Japan is another case; check Toyota.com and Toyota.jp. Same company; completely different designs.

lightmac wrote:

Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

I think the vast majority of the flying public couldn't give 2 hoots about the livery of an airliner. Of those who care, only a small portion of them (if such people exist at all) actually base (or even part of) their purchase decision on it.
I cannot agree with scbriml more. Beauty is subjective. I personally don't like MU's old design but their new livery is much improved in my opinion. As you can see from post #5, member MartijnNL has exactly the opposite perception. I don't think we need a better example to illustrate my point.
By the way, can you tell me what the big difference between this

and this is?


What about this


and this?

Cerecl wrote:

lightmac wrote:

Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

I think the vast majority of the flying public couldn't give 2 hoots about the livery of an airliner. Of those who care, only a small portion of them (if such people exist at all) actually base (or even part of) their purchase decision on it.
I cannot agree with scbriml more. Beauty is subjective. I personally don't like MU's old design but their new livery is much improved in my opinion. As you can see from post #5, member MartijnNL has exactly the opposite perception. I don't think we need a better example to illustrate my point.
By the way, can you tell me what the big difference between this

and this is?


What about this


and this?

AF is the only airline worldwide that can pull off Eurowhite.

Jokes aside, to answer the OP's question, China's colour schemes are not ugly, at least for many. It's something called an opinion, and it varies between people. By the way the livery you slap on your aircraft won't change much about who flies your airline. If that was the case I can already see a certain German airline out of business

China Southen is beautiful, Shanghai is beautiful, Shandong Is great, SF is great, Xiamen is very nice too.

China Southern's A380 (and to a lesser extent, their other planes) is like a guilty pleasure for me. They're objectively poor designs, but whenever I see them I really, really like them.

Air China, with its red, white, and blue, looks more like something a US airline would pull off.

Who does branding for Chinese carriers? Is it ever a professional firm or is it all in house? That may be the main difference.

I think Xiamen's livery is great. MU's sucks though. And while I personally find the yellow/red liveries a bit gaudy, at least they are colorful and culturally appropriate.

It boils down the chinese (and asian) tastes in style being diffefent to western tastes in style. While the grand majority of other countries in asia were open to western influences (fashion, media, pop culture, movies, stores) since the 1950s, China really did so widely starting only in the 1990s. And unlike other sectors in china (automotive, restaurants, fashion, ecommerce, manufacturing), the airline industry has no top foreign management which is typically a driver in westernization in this respect.

This thread looks like one more piece of jingoistic trolling to me. There is a general tendency in the world for airlines to move to cheap bland liveries, and Chinese ones are actually not the worst, why specifically target them?

To the topic:

Air China livery is a higly sensitive political issue: after all, it's the airline that flies the chief of state on official trips abroad. So any change to its livery must be approved on the highest state level, which makes it very complicated. They catch up by doing special liveries some of which are beautiful: see, for example, B-6076 and B-6075 or the now retired B-2059 and B-2060.

China Eastern is one of these airlines that decided to "pull a JAL" and say "Why do we need a livery at all?". Stupid move, in my opinion, but all the "Passengers only care about price" crowd must be clapping their hands.

China Southern is probably not the most beautiful design you'll see in the world but it's OK. The version on the 787 looks great actually, although I dislike the plane.

Other than that, there's plenty of great designs with smaller airlines. For example, Juneyao Red is sheer beauty (it's a pity they don't have it on all of their planes). Loong Air is great too although the name sounds a bit stupid in English.

Beauty is not completely subjective

Sunsets, rainbows, tigers etc are found beautiful by whole mankind.

It is a matter of different aesthetic in their market; I doubt they see a lot of value in using a Western branding agency.

I personally think there is something appealing about the CA and CZ liveries and like that they haven't necessarily been tinkered with over the years. However I am not a fan of the HNA Group aesthetic and the new MU livery is of course downright terrible. I would have categorized the previous MU livery with CA and CZ - dated but charming.

"Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder" -a phrase generally attributed to Oscar Wilde although it is older. Or,as AirFrance would say: " La beaute est dans les yeux de celui qui regarde". --Now,guys, have you seen lately the livery of Hainan Airlines? Oh my GAWD it is as the saying goes: "The Chinese dragon has awaken"! What unfurling flames,spirals,waves and the like,as if coming out of the mouth of a dragon. But that's the trademark of China after all,have you ever seen for example, a Chinese carpet? Too many embellishments. We will get used to it....
PS. In a sense,this is a long-overdue thread...

Because contrary to what people on here believe, the consumer does not care about liveries and color schemes.....They care about price and time of travel.....

workhorse wrote:

Air China livery is a higly sensitive political issue

I'd revise that to all of the 'legacy' Chinese carriers. CA, CZ, and MU are all direct descendants of old CA — back when the CAAC was the only organization allowed to operate civilian flights within China. Their liveries (well, MU's old one) all reflect this heritage — a double-cheatline in blue with a grey belly was the CAAC livery, and minor changes were made when the airlines were split out (with CA only swapping the Chinese flag for the phoenix logo they use now). The fact that they're still using some derivative of the CAAC logo is no weirder than United still using the Continental Globe rather than the Bass Tulip

Edit: Forgot to make a point. The changes that are being made are experiments to make the planes more distinguishable from one another — nobody's confusing MU's livery for CA's anymore, but the old one was a lot closer.

MartijnNL wrote:

The new China Eastern colour scheme looks so much worse than the old one.

Yes! Except the black nose dot

axiom wrote:

lightmac wrote:

If beauty was entirely subjective there would be no famous models/actresses/actors. While of course there are variations, the rules of proportion are true for everybody and thus beauty is largely consensual. It is true for airline design as well.
Are you suggesting that as many people enjoy the liveries of say "China Southern" as much as that of a well-designed, stylish livery?

I don't think you understand what subjectivity is. Or normative thinking, for that matter.

I think your question about liveries is loaded.

This

De gustibus non est disputandum. I've always loved Hainan's livery. Air China, China Southern & Xiamen are bland, but hardly ugly. China Eastern looks a bit old fashioned, but I wouldn't call it ugly either. Shandong is rather nice. For me, the only ugly livery from China is Beijing Capital. Their livery with that blue blotch looks to me like airliners from 2 different carriers have just emerged from the matter transmitter in The Fly. It cries "Help me! Help me!"
Supermodels and actresses? Piffle. You don't even have to look at cultural differences. Look at the different standards of beauty in Hollywood today vs. 80 or 90 years ago.

This is very, very subjective.
I don't agree with the OP. In my opinion, Chinese carriers have very nice liveries.

Hainan Airlines is very colorful and striking.
Air China may have an old-fashioned livery but I like it.
China Eastern had a great livery and replaced with the all-white crap they have now.
China Southern is also very nice.

Other carriers seem to have lots of colorful, LCC-like liveries. What's the big deal here?

FromCDGtoSYD wrote:

It's gone now but Asiana's old livery was.... special to say the least.

Didn't know Asiana was.......Chinese

Amsterdam wrote:

Beauty is not completely subjective

Sunsets, rainbows, tigers etc are found beautiful by whole mankind.

I dont think tigers are beautiful

Honu A388. Turn a whale into a turtle. That's livery power.

The HNA group of airline liveries are excellent! I flew last month on Tainjin Airlines and loved the colorful, interesting design. Sichuan Airlines liveries look great too, it would be difficult to call them boring. Have you seen Juneyao Airline's explosion of color on their planes? While you can point out Air China's minimalist livery, Xaimen's offering is sleek, modern and quite hip. Maybe the OP hasn't actually been to China and seen their diverse collection of liveries? Or maybe just embracing some tired old stereotype. Making such wide blanket statements about a country is quite ignorant.

SamTheGeek wrote:

workhorse wrote:

Air China livery is a higly sensitive political issue

I'd revise that to all of the 'legacy' Chinese carriers.

Not as much as CA. MU and CZ do not fly Uncle Xi to Florida to meet with his buddy Don. I don't think MU had to get a green light from Zhongnanhai to do the disgrace that is their current "livery".

HOOB747 wrote:

Have you seen Juneyao Airline's explosion of color on their planes?

Juneyao's "full red" livery kicks ass big time. There's nothing that comes close to it in North America since Northwest disappeared and Air Canada did their current piece of poo.

I think that it is also important to consider the age of the livery here. Some liveries look better than the old ones just because they provide fresh air after years of an old livery (like AA in my opinion). However, in the limit, after many years, their older livery will be well remembered much more. I apologize for being subjective or even potentially sexist here, but in their 20s, Madonna and Monica Belucci were considered beautiful, but not the most beautiful, while among 50+ they look just stunning. However, for some airlines, like LH, even the freshness of the livery doesn’t do it (maybe because the old one was not so old).

I always thought the Chinese big 3 kept things bland because It will cost less to repaint them back to CAAC colors when they are all folded back into CAAC.

Also remember that livery changes may not always be popular. One such example that comes to mind is Air India’s 1989-91 livery. Although that livery could be considered more “modern,” it was unpopular among both passengers and airline staff, so it was dropped after just two years.

I think people are confusing two issues here.

Beauty and aesthetic quality are NOT entirely subjective. As someone said above, if you show 100 faces to 100 people you will get broad agreement on what is considered beautiful or not.

However that does not translate into aesthetic *appeal*. I can see why people might admire NZ's livery, but I don't like it. I wouldn't hesitate to say Cindy Crawford (in her younger days) was beautiful; but she did nothing for me whatsoever. TG's livery is stunning, but if you don't like purple you're a bit stuffed.

Chinese airlines fail at the first hurdle. They are NOT beautiful. There has clearly been only an absolute minimum utilitarian effort put into them. Their purpose is that of labeling, not marketing.

I think this is just a matter of personal opinion. For example, I really like the Xiamen livery and the China Southern livery (just not on A380). But I also like many liveries a lot of people don’t like (like AF, UA, IB new, LH old new). I think we can all agree though that the MU livery is absolute trash.

Edit: I also dislike a lot of liveries people like (KL, LH old, LH new new, anything with yellow, anythingunder 50% white)

*Most* Chinese airline liveries are ugly, you say?












Nope. I'm struggling to agree with you sir. In fact they put most European and American airline liveries to shame.

I think the original poster used the wrong word - "ugly"......earlier Chinese liveries were very formal, minimal and almost military like.......but not really ugly....one could call them boring, certainly....but as evidenced above, the Chinese airlines have certainly improved the aesthetics of their liveries......but considering it's China, with all their beautiful artistry and heritage, one could hope for more creative and beautiful liveries in future....

leleko747 wrote:

Hainan Airlines is very colorful and striking.

It’s not uncommon to see the yellow, white, red, and gold Hainan Panda 789’s in Boston within a few days of each other.

747WanSui wrote:

Also remember that livery changes may not always be popular. One such example that comes to mind is Air India’s 1989-91 livery. Although that livery could be considered more “modern,” it was unpopular among both passengers and airline staff, so it was dropped after just two years.

Lufthansa should follow the same steps. Amen.