Press Release

Take Your Seat: A History of Airline Passenger Chairs Exhibition Now on View at SFO

08/25/2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

CONTACT: Jane Sullivan
Manager, Marketing and Communications
(650) 821-5152
SF-08-38

 

Take Your Seat: A History of Airline Passenger Chairs
Exhibition Now on View at SFO

SAN FRANCISCO -- Take Your Seat: A History of Airline Passenger Chairs, a new exhibition at San Francisco International Airport, presents the progress of airline seating design and manufacturing. As the piece of cabin equipment most readily identified with the passenger experience, the chairs on view trace the development of airline seating from its modest origins in the trimotor transport planes of the 1920s, through the era of intercontinental propliners when comfort emerged as an important selling point, to the jet age when chairs became the subject of intensive study and design resulting in the sophisticated, multi-functional sitting machines of today. 

 

The exhibition features examples of passenger chairs that include early single seats made of wicker and bent wood, the transition to aluminum-framed seats, reclining seats that introduced deep foam rubber cushioning, and first-class seating with multiple controls and personal electronics. Accompanying photographs and illustrations depict related cabin interior views and aircraft of the period.

 

Downloadable photographs from the exhibition are available at: http://www.flysfo.com/web/page/about/news/pressres/exh-chairs.html.

 

Take Your Seat: A History of Airline Passenger Chairs is on view through January 15, 2009. The exhibition is located in the San Francisco Airport Commission Aviation Library and Louis A. Turpen Aviation Museum, pre-security on the Departures/Ticketing Level of the International Terminal, adjacent to the entrance to Boarding Area A. The library and museum is open free of charge from 10:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sunday through Friday, and closed Saturdays and holidays.

 

San Francisco Airport Museums

The San Francisco Airport Museums program was established by the Airport Commission in 1980 for the purposes of humanizing the Airport environment, providing visibility for the unique cultural life of San Francisco, and providing educational services for the traveling public. The Museum was granted initial accreditation from the American Association of Museums in 1999, reaccredited in 2005, and has the distinction of being the only accredited museum in an airport. Today, the San Francisco Airport Museums features approximately twenty galleries throughout the Airport terminals displaying a rotating schedule of art, history, science, and cultural exhibitions, as well as the San Francisco Airport Commission Aviation Library and Louis A. Turpen Aviation Museum, a permanent collection dedicated to the history of commercial aviation.

 

S-F-O

 

About San Francisco International Airport

SFO (www.flysfo.com) offers non-stop links with more than 30 international points on 26 international carriers. The Bay Area's Airport of Choice connects non-stop with more than 65 cities in the United States on 21 domestic airlines, including more than six times as many non-stop flights to the New York area than the other Bay Area airports combined.