Jeddah Hajj Terminal, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
One of the world's most radical airport terminals is one most Americans are unlikely to ever travel through. The Jeddah Hajj Terminal is unique: it's only active during the "hajj," a religiously mandated pilgrimage to Mecca for Muslims. During that six-week period, it's one of the busiest airport terminals in the world.
The Hajj Terminal received the American Institute of Architects' 25-year award as a design that's stood the test of time: it's made of 210 open-air, white fiberglass tents which create a "chimney effect" that can cool the hot desert air by 50 degrees without expensive, hard-to-maintain air conditioning, according to a profile in the Architectural Record. The tents can contain 80,000 people, with flexible spaces devoted to very unusual activities for an airport terminal, such as changing clothes and ritual foot-washing.
The terminal gets some knocks online for being, as one Skytrax reviewer says, "chaotic and basic." But no other airline terminal has its unique challenges: being literally the gateway to heaven for tens of thousands of people a day, many of whom are making this a once-in-a-lifetime trip.
Seoul Incheon Airport, Incheon, South Korea
Never mind how it looks from the outside: Seoul's airport regularly gets awards for how well-organized, efficient and relaxing it is on the inside. I've been there several times, and Seoul's secret is to make sure that you're never more than a few steps away from an entertaining, enlightening, or amusing bit of Korean culture.
Scattered throughout the terminal like Easter eggs, you'll find hands-on Korean craft workshops, a dress-up area where you can take photos in traditional clothing, the best free Internet cafes you've ever seen (and yes, that's absolutely a bit of Korean culture), a museum, and plenty of places to take a comfortable nap. Want to try a traditional Korean bathhouse? Head to the basement. Plants and flowers keep up the impression that you're in a showplace for Korea's melding of history, art and technology, and not just a mere airport terminal.
Leif Eriksson Air Terminal, Keflavik, Iceland
Iceland's cozy little international airport looks like it arrived in a flat pack from IKEA. It's all blond wood and volcanic-looking stone with big windows looking out on the dramatic Icelandic landscape. There's a lot more wood in this airport than you'll find in most terminals, and instead of being a design accent near the ceiling (as in Madrid), it's on the floor, making the terminal feel much more natural and less sterile than usual.
The best buildings capture a bit of the soul of a place, and the Keflavik terminal does that perfectly: it's cozy (maybe a little too cozy in some of the gate areas), made of local materials, relatively spare and utterly embedded in the landscape. As a greeting to Iceland, it's perfect.
Marrakech Menara Airport Terminal 1, Marrakech, Morocco
This one is another great example of culturally aware terminal design. The new Terminal 1 at Marrakech's airport looks like a Moroccan palace twenty-first-century style, with classic Islamic geometric and nature motifs inscribed into a giant network of concrete diamonds. You could make a strong argument that the whole thing is one giant artwork.
At night, colored lights dance along the front face of the building, illuminating the desert plantings along the arrivals roadway. A lounge inside evokes 19th-century Moroccan luxury, with rugs, chandeliers, and a wrought-metal dome.
