The aircraft liveries and logos of airlines are used to provide distinctive branding for corporate and commercial reasons. They also have to combine powerful symbols of national identity while being acceptable to an international market.[1]
National flag, symbol, or elements thereof
Russian flags on Aeroflot aircraft
Aeroflot: National flag, with traditional winged hammer and sickle used on fuselage. New livery adopted in 2003.
Air Canada: Blue aircraft, with the name AIR CANADA and a stylized maple leaf on the front area of the fuselage, directly behind the cockpit, plus a maple leaf on the tail.
Air France: National flag, formed as several sliced parallel lines of varying widths.
Alitalia: National color flag in the "A" logo on the tail and in all plane.
American Airlines: Highly stylized national flag on the tail, with the upgraded eagle design near the front exit doors. New livery adopted in February 2013.
Austrian Airlines: Red-white-red tailfin with chevron (symbolizing an airplane taking off) with drop shadow added.
British Airways: Britain's Flag carrier shows a section of the British Union Flag on the aircraft tail. Some aircraft feature the Union Jack under the nose.
Cathay Pacific: A brush-stroke logo dubbed the "brush wing" represents a bird in flight through white Chinese calligraphy stroke on a green background.
China Airlines: The pink plum blossom is the national flower Republic of China (Taiwan) and is the livery for this flag carrier.
Continental Airlines and new livery for United Airlines: A globe, indicative of the wide-ranging destinations available, initially to counteract Continental's possibly geographically restrictive name.
EgyptAir: The airline's logo is Horus, the sky deity in ancient Egyptian mythology, usually depicted as a falcon or a man with the head of a falcon. The airline has taken Horus as its logo because of his ancient symbolism as a "winged god of the sun".
Iberia: An aircraft tailfin shape from a yellow piece and red piece (the Spanish flag colors). Formerly a stylized IB in yellow and red with a crown.
Kenya Airways: In 2005, Kenya Airways changed its livery. The four stripes running all through the length of the fuselage were replaced by the company slogan Pride of Africa, whereas the KA tail logo was replaced by a styled K encircled with a Q to evoke the airline's IATA airline code.
KLM: stylized crown representing royal charter status
LAN Airlines: A five-points star over a blue background representing the one which is the national flag of Chile, also representing the two colors of it second flag carrier subsindary, Peru, and its flag colors, white and a red line below it.
Malev Hungarian Airlines: National flag shaped as a tail wing made of 3 lines with the national colors (red white green).
Middle East Airlines: A cedar, which is the national emblem of Lebanon, over the white tail and with two red bands rolling from the aircraft nose to tail
Pakistan International Airlines: National flag in a wavy design takes up whole tail in official Pakistan dark green colours with white crescent moon and star as found on the Pakistan flag.
Hawaiian Airlines: A Hawaiian Native woman, also known as "Pualani" (Hawaiian for Flower in the Sky). Some claim it is also a former Miss Hawaii.[citation needed]
Norwegian Air Shuttle: Each individual tail fin in the fleet features one historical Nordic entrepreneur, artist, painter, actor or explorer.
Delta Air Lines: A red widget, rotated to represent a takeoff (updated 2007). Alternatively, it points northwest due to the merger with Northwest Airlines.
EVA Air: Dark green background with a global logo in orange and green.
Northwest Airlines: A stylized compass rose pointing northwest (on the port side - the compass points northeast on the starboard side). This up-and-forward-pointing design influenced Delta Air Lines' current livery.
Philippine Airlines: A two triangles of blue and red with a sun superimposed on the blue triangle.
Ryanair: A morph between a flying angel and a harp.
United Airlines: Blue and red colored stripes forming an overlapping "U" for "United". Nicknamed the Tulip. New United Airlines, after Continental merger, uses the globe from Continental Airlines.
Srilankan Airlines: A 'monara' from the mythical Dandumonara Yanthra (a flying machine that resembles a peacock).
Varig: Varig's first logo was an image of Icaro and its wings. After the adoption of the famous "star" (in fact it was a stylished compass) the Icaro figure was maintained on the fuselage of the airplanes, near the front door.
Unpopular designs
British Airways introduced varied and unusual tailfin designs in 1997. These "airline liveries and logos" were intended to make the airline's branding more cosmopolitan and were described as "arty" and "ethnic". They were unpopular with many customers and also caused confusion for ground controllers who had more difficulty recognising the British Airways ethnic liveries aircraft to give clear taxiing instructions. Despite the £60M expense of this livery, it was replaced completely in 2001 and the airline has now returned to a more traditional design based upon the Union flag.[2]
Brussels Airlines' first logo was a stylised letter B composed of 13 dots resembling a runway. This was thought to be unlucky and protests by superstitious passengers caused the airline to add another dot.[3]