A bamboo-inspired sky forest in northeast India, a giant lotus flower seemingly floating above Mumbai and a Cambodian terminal sheltered beneath a cover of towering “trees” have been named among the many world’s most beautiful airports for 2026.
The seven airports and terminals have been chosen for the annual Prix Versailles World’s Most Beautiful Airports List, unveiled in Paris this summer time. The structure awards – which recognise excellent up to date design around the globe – selected tasks in China, Germany, India, Cambodia and the United States that it stated exhibit how airports are evolving into locations in their very own proper.
The checklist spans every part from Guangzhou’s flower-inspired Terminal 3 and Frankfurt’s huge city-sized growth to Pittsburgh’s mountain-shaped roofline and San Diego’s glass-wrapped waterfront gateway. Three of the seven tasks will go on to obtain extra world titles for structure, inside or exterior design later this 12 months.
According to the judges, the chosen airports exhibit how trendy terminals are more and more balancing the calls for of sooner, higher-volume journey with a rising expectation that airports ought to supply a significant sense of place quite than functioning solely as transit infrastructure. Jérôme Gouadain, Secretary General of the Prix Versailles, stated up to date airports had turn out to be “innovative, inescapable hallmarks of their regions and their eras”.
He added: “They are innovative, because they resolve the apparent conflict between the increasing frequency of travel and the need for speed – both central to an airport’s purpose – on the one hand and, on the other, the singularity of a form of tourism that aims to be accessible and that values people’s time in places that, in this day and age, can no longer be described as mere ‘transfer’ spaces.
“And they’re inescapable, in that this infrastructure leaves a lasting environmental footprint on the land but in addition on the historical past of humanity: within the amalgamation of structure that they show, airports have gotten enticing settings, emblems of financial, cultural and social dynamics that may proceed to form the societies of tomorrow, draw them collectively and unify them.”
The world’s most beautiful airports for 2026
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Prix Versailles
Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, Terminal 3
Guangzhou is named China’s City of Flowers, and its new Terminal 3 combines clouds, water and blossoms into a sequence of curves, terraces, gardens and light-filled atriums set in one of many world’s largest transport buildings. Designed by Artelia in collaboration with the Guangdong Architectural Design and Research Institute, the terminal attracts closely on Lingnan tradition, the southern Chinese custom formed by Guangzhou’s subtropical local weather and lengthy historical past as a buying and selling port. The constructing’s natural varieties assist steer passengers by the terminal, whereas gardens and open areas break up its monumental scale. Its most dramatic outside function is alleged to be the best open-air public remark deck at any Chinese airport, giving travellers a uncommon likelihood to step exterior and watch plane shifting throughout the runways under.