Eero Saarinen
Saarinen didn’t invent a style—he invented a method for making form answer function, then insisted others do the same.
On design.briefs
TWA Flight Center
Eero Saarinen · 1962
A terminal built for Trans World Airlines at JFK Airport in 1962. Designed by Eero Saarinen and Associates with Charles J. Parise. Its wing-shaped thin-shell concrete roof uses catenary curves and rests on four Y-shaped piers. Developed through physical modelling—not sketching—after empirical study of passenger movement. Adapted into the TWA Hotel in 2019, retaining Saarinen’s furniture.