No matter how you put it, the window seat is always the best when travelling via "the highway in the sky." Watching the world pass below you from thousands of feet in the air is an incredibly enthralling experience and effectively takes your mind off that sad, stale bag of honey-roasted peanuts in your hand.
For an experience that takes place in the air, the designers and engineers behind passenger aircraft in the past century have left out a huge opportunity to make that experience even more enthralling: create one ginormous window.
Such is the case with Technicon Design's new private jet concept "Ixion." Described as a "windowless" jet, the design features a large, open-glass cabin to provide an immersive flying experience:
"We quickly settled on the controversial yet interesting idea of removing the windows from the cabin and using existing or very near future technology to display the exterior environment to the inside surfaces of the cabin via external cameras. Removing the windows allows for weight reduction, simplifies construction and opens up an enormous spectrum of possibilities for interior design. We wanted to couple this with amorphous solar panels which power the low voltage systems on board and thus offer a unique visual dynamic for the exterior," says Technicon in its press release.
"The user experience is greatly enhanced by directly engaging the passengers with the environment outside, to the point of exhilaration by giving an unhindered panoramic view from the inside. Parallax barrier technology allows the passengers to see different views at the same time on the same screen."
IXION Windowless Jet Concept from Technicon Design - France on Vimeo.
While this is merely just a concept -- and a private jet concept at that -- it opens up an entirely new discussion about what the future of air travel might look like. The Technicon Design France team received an award at the International Yacht & Aviation Awards 2014 ceremony in London for its Ixion windowless jet concept, winning in the private aviation Exterior Design Concept category.
The automotive industry has always been a key player in introducing new trends in design ranging from colors and materials to embedded technologies and designs that respond to current consumer demands. Some of the more recent car designs have emphasized having "open-air" concepts by omitting unnecessary interior details for larger windows. Could this be a sign of what's to trickle over to the aviation industry, whether or not it's for private jets or 747s?
Our guess is that as we grow more comfortable with sitting in these machines while being plugged into mobile devices, our desire to be more connected with the outside world won't just be a desire, it will be a necessity.
As for the peanuts, they'll probably still be stale.
