Today saw Hawaiian Airlines bring their latest livery and logo to the skies emblazened on a freshly-painted Boeing 717. The new livery has been painstakingly refreshed to bring the carrier’s Aloha spirit forward into the 21st century.
Pualani (Flower of the Sky), the beloved icon of Hawaiian’s brand for more than four decades “continues to gaze forward on the tail of the aircraft; beneath her, a silver maile lei with woven pakalana flowers wraps around the fuselage in a larger-than-life expression of the aloha spirit,” states the press release.
“Our new livery embodies a stronger, more contemporary representation of Hawaiian Airlines’ culture of service and hospitality, which is the bedrock of our guest experience,” said president and CEO Mark Dunkerley, who unveiled the new brand design at Honolulu International Airport during a special employee event on Lei Day, a statewide annual celebration of Hawaiian culture. “It acknowledges our place as Hawaii’s airline and underscores the commitment our employees make every day to provide our guests with a gracious and genuine island welcome.”
We are thrilled to see Pualani remain, and there is little reason for us to expect her to go. It symbolises Hawaii and the airline perfectly. In fact, most people probably won’t see a great difference – the major difference being in the addition of a silver lei now wrapping around the fuselage.
Hawaiian worked with Lippincott, a global creative consultancy, on the new identity. Hawaiian’s brand team and Lippincott spent a year studying the airline’s history, working with a committee of front-line employees, and immersing themselves in Hawaiian culture to arrive at the new design.
The new logo, which we can’t help feel that it looks a little bit like the waze app icon (speech bubble), has been carefully considered, and is clean and will be easy to apply to a range of different touch points. It is supported by a slightly more aggressive typeface, with the ‘A’s of Hawaiian featuring a cut out wedge. This perhaps reflects both ‘direction’ and its traditional roots, but we did prefer, the warmer, friendlier rounded typeface the previous incarnation had. There was a retro warmth that actually reflects Hawaii’s nature – anyone who has travelled through O’ahu International Airport will be able to recognise that.
“So much of our visual identity, which is 15 years old, still resonated deeply with our guests and employees,” said Avi Mannis, senior vice president of marketing for Hawaiian. “Our aim was to retain the essence of our brand and arrive at a bolder, truer expression of our unique Hawaiian hospitality.” Painting of all aircraft and ground service equipment is scheduled to be complete by 2020.
This is a welcome refresh, and should be seen as the airline wanting to keep true to its roots, rather than a full redesign.
TheDesignAir 
Waw amazing !!
Last livery was beautiful and I was afraid they would ruin the new one since the bar was high . Thay did not make LAN’s mistake and they totally nailed it !
Phewwww…. Well done Hawaiian and Lippincott, pretty well-executed Branding light facelift. The lovely Pualani still there but redesigned with a more smiling facial expression … The addition of the maile Lei flowers (in silver) must be seen in the real context to see how it does catch up the light and interfere with the rest of the livery. However, a tiny line detail at the tailfin departure and lower, I think this line could have been better integrated with the others curve lines around. Less enthusiastic on the logotype redesign. Too aggressive for me. Plus, Hawaiian word is hard to read for the eyes, 3 A, 2 i, 1 N 1 W etc.. complex lettering combo; they should have kept it more simple, with minimal cuts effects. Still not convinced about the “speech bubble” shape… but with time, who knows…
I agree with Nico. For the most part I like this refreshed livery, though I too preferred the previous logotype. And I’m not sure about the “speech bubble” shape of the logo… But these are minor quibbles.
Now, Hawaiian, how about bringing some of the livery’s tropical colors inside your planes? Those new brown interiors are dark and depressing.
Your branding update looks really classy and represents your airline so well. Look forward to our annual hawaiian visit and yr airline and staff always lead us to the islands with efficiency and a genuine ohana welcome. Mahalo.
I prefer the DC-9 scheme the best, just my opinion…..one thing I didnt realize is seeing an airline paint scheme at night and how different it is…..saw a Hawaiian A330 in SYD wednesday night and could only make out the name and part of the tail that was lit…..the new scheme will not show the new lei across the top or the outside fringes of the tail logo unless it has a light showing on it…..saw Ethiads new scheme, once off the jetway, it blended with the night…. One of Emirates wildlife planes, now that can be seen at night, animals 2 stories high can be missed, Cathay Pacific 777 in new colors just looked bare….EVA, Qantas, JAL, ANA, and a few others you could see fine taxing at night… small differences wont stick out….. do airlines think of what the paint scheme looks like at night or just in the day……some places never see an airline’s scheme when they fly one flight at night all the time…..just curios on the day/night visual on seeing paint schemes……the best night scheme I saw was singapore A350 with the bright light on the tail logo, cant miss it…..MC