Celebrating airport architecture on Instagram with collections from Europeana.eu

Ned Russell tells us about his enthusiasm for airport architecture and how material from Europeana.eu helps him to share it with his AvGeek community.

Hi, Ned. Tell us a bit about yourself.

I’m an 'AvGeek' - someone who really likes all things aviation. I’ve been one since I was a young child. I live in Washington DC, and have been an aviation journalist for more than 15 years. I love my job - I get to do a lot of travelling. As such, I’ve flown a lot and been through a lot of airports. Increasingly, I started to think about the architecture of the places I’ve been going through - what works, what’s good for kids etc. I started to take photos and amassed a collection.

I set up Airport Architecture as an Instagram account around 2018 as a way to express photos I thought were interesting. I try not to give too much of my opinion, just present the architecture and let the commenters add their thoughts.

I started the account with my photos, then photos of friends, then I gained traction and started looking for institutions. That’s what led me to Europeana.eu.

Tell us a bit about how you use Europeana.eu

I use Europeana.eu to search for photos and increasingly videos of airport architecture. That takes me down a rabbit hole - I do a generic search for ‘airport’ and then sift through the results. I like to post photos of airports I’m travelling to. If I’m going to Europe, I’ll search for that airport, for example, I went to Munich a few weeks ago.

When I find something on Europeana.eu, I look at the providing institution and see if they have a number of photos, then I’ll go over to their site to see what they have there.

What I love about Europeana.eu is that numerous providing institutions submit photos of the same places. It makes my life easier as I can search multiple providers at once. I’m more familiar with the US photo library system than Europe’s so it’s nice to have a resource like Europeana.eu to use.

My first post using an item from Europeana.eu is this one:

I love the resource, it’s fantastic and a lot of fun. I dive in and always manage to find new stuff. Just the other day I found a video of the Eero Saarinen-designed terminal at Athens Ellinikon airport, which is now not open any more. I posted it straight away.

What has been your best find on Europeana.eu so far?

I love beautiful images from the Jet Age. Europeana.eu led me to the Oslo museum which has gorgeous photos of Oslo airport in the 1960s. It was the golden age of air travel, and the pictures express its iconic look - its architecture, its people, the international style of the time.

Staying in the Nordics, I love Helsinki Airport. These images are from the era when it first opened. It’s so clean, so simple, it’s what an airport ideally should be - cohesive and just gorgeous. A lot of airports have been expanded over the years and have lost some of that simplicity and truth to architecture. I love seeing these buildings as they initially were when they were planned and seeing what the architect was thinking.

I try to post once a day but it’s hard - I have two kids. My aim is to have a bunch of photos lined up so I can hit ‘post’ and get on with my day. I sit down once a month and search for a couple of hours and build up lots to post.

I have just under 8,000 followers right now and it’s growing. The most successful posts are not always the ones I would think. They are typically something from the 1960s, ‘70s, or ‘80s and something that stands out like contrasts of colour, ‘80s silver cladding, or neon signs. These things look gorgeous in the photos but did not age well!

What are you thinking about at the moment?

I like to highlight interesting airports - the mundane is just as important as the star-chitect fabulous buildings. I want to bring the world to these buildings that we all pass through and we don’t think much about (unless they’re terrible).

I was reading a monograph about the Munich airport architect Koch and partner (Munich Airport Terminal 2: Koch + Partner by Christoph Hackelsberger). He put it really well, writing, ‘Airports would be rather mundane places if they were not populated by swarms of passengers, travelers, those in a hurry and those with time to linger.’ It’s true, they would just be buildings if we weren’t travelling through them, running for a flight, or enjoying a cup of coffee. I want to highlight the beautiful and the mundane.

Where do you find inspiration?

I follow a lot of architecture organisations like Docomomo, modern architecture advocacy org, I like their posts. I’m a fan of Brutalism feeds like Brutal House. And I follow prominent architects working on airports today like Luis Vidal Architects and Evelyn Reid Aeropuertos. Those are the accounts I tend to follow.

I also have an AvGeek community that’s separate from the airport architecture stuff and I have lots of friends who travel and have opinions!

What plans do you have for Airport Architecture in the future?

I will keep posting! I recently started a Substack newsletter where I add some commentary to the photos. It’s a place to share the research I’ve done while looking for photographs. What building is this? When did it open? Is it still in operation or demolished? Who was the architect? I learn a lot about these airports, so I started the Substack to share that research.