Salt Lake City’s New Airport Is Art-Filled, Multi-Sensorial, and Designed for the Future

11.06.2024 - 22:27 / cntraveler.com

Customary travel wisdom says spending a few hours in a city’s airport doesn’t “count” as experiencing the place itself. That’s because American airports today are often viewed as transitory hubs removed from space and time—like a mall or suburban highway strip—visit one and you could be anywhere in the US.

But the airports of the future will be infused with local business, art, and food that let you know exactly where you are in the world upon arrival or departure. That’s what the Salt Lake City airport (SLC) has aimed to do through a $3.6 billion rebuild that’s been unveiled in phases over the past few years, to be completed in 2026.

Known as the New SLC, the project is considered the first new US hub airport built in the 21st Century—and this fall is its grand reveal. Come October, the airport will unveil “Phase 3,” which includes a central tunnel connecting concourses A & B (the “River Tunnel”), a new multi-gate expansion, a highly anticipated new greeting room, more impressive art installations, and a mini plaza with retail and food and beverage concessions (with a handful of local brands, like Salt Lake City’s Weller Book Works). Next up—under construction until the airport’s final 2026 completion—SLC will be revealing more gates with loading bridges.

We got a sneak peek of Phase 3 of the New SLC and the design is modern, sensorial, and steeped in a sense of place, from the artful touches of copper paint colors (Utah’s known for copper mining), to flourishes of sage (which grows all over the state) in its terrazzo floors, to the upcoming tunnel installation simulating the flow of a river flowing through a canyon.

“When you design a hub airport, the focus is often on efficiency over beauty. But who wants to be in a nameless, faceless airport?" Matt Needham, Director of Aviation + Transportation at HOK (the architecture firm responsible for SLC), tells Condé Nast Traveler. “Our goal in Salt Lake City was to create a distinctive space that was of the place.”

SLC is one of Delta's fastest-growing hubs in the US.

Not only were they able to bring the beauty of the state of Utah to the airport, and right inside the facility—they have also worked with creatives to create an iconic, design-led, art-filled, eco-conscious airport. Since 2015, the Salt Lake City Department of Airports have partnered with artist Gordon Huether for the airport’s Terminal Redevelopment Program; he created the comprehensive art master plan including numerous large scale art installations, a curation of the airport’s art collection, plus a facilitation of future public art opportunities.

“I wanted to give something to everyone: whether you’re a pilot, working in the restaurants on site, visiting the state, or just trying to get