An image appeared on Flyertalk yesterday which appears to show the new British Airways Club World seats for the forthcoming A350 aircraft.
I have not reproduced the image because it has been stolen from an internal British Airways IT system and, if genuine, is obviously under BA copyright.
You can, however, see it in the first post of this Flyertalk thread (unless BA has taken steps to have it removed by the time you read this).
The first thing you will notice is that the standard ‘ying yang’ layout has been retained.
Note the comment on the slide though – “Direct aisle access for every seat”. This would be a major step forward for the Club World product if confirmed.
It isn’t fully clear how BA intends to do this. The Emirates solution is to make the aisle seats shorter than the seats by the windows or in the centre of the middle block in order to create a gap for the other person to get out. The person who published the slide implies that the cabin may have one fewer row of seats in order to accommodate this.
You shouldn’t get too excited by any of this. British Airways only has 18 A350 aircraft on firm order with an option for 18 more, and they won’t start arriving until 2018. It has already stated that the new Club World seats used on these aircraft will not be fitted on the A380, 777, 787 or 747 fleets.
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If i understand the diagram correctly, the two seats are different sizes. Although this msut add cost and complexity to design, build and maintenance, this seems a good idea that could be pushed further.
It makes seat selection even more critical but means you can make more efficient use of the weird spaces available in aircraft and keep more people happy (bigger seat for larger customers, smaller seats to fill up awkward spaces and make seat layout more efficient).
That is what Emirates have always done. Aisle seats are shorter.
Bit annoying for as we put the kids together in the middle, even though they dont need the space, and then we get squeezed a bit on the outside seats.
I’m not sure that the diagram does show different sizes. It shows different widths for seat and bed because the arm rests in CW drop down to bed level as the seat reclines.
Interesting you reported on this, despite it being pointed out by BA staff that this is NOT the seat coming on the A350.
The employee has found a seat proposal document made by a seat manufacture, there are also such detailed documents produced for other designs – including the ‘Sofa’ design that was patented.