Furniture Created From Aviation Parts

Aero Art Shop, started in 2015 by the owners of Aircraft Demolition, created this clock from a Pratt & Whitney JT8 Engine Stator. If you look closely, you can see that the middle is hand-etched copper scrap.

Tim Zemanovic, the CEO of Aircraft Demolition, saved parts from projects for years, despite workers and outsiders commenting that he was losing money by not scrapping them. Finally, Aero Art Shop was born. Once a week, the team of five, managed by Erin Zemanovic, who are dedicated solely to create the works of furniture and art for the shop, gather for a "mock-up" day. Each team member pitches an idea for their piece, but all end up contributing to the finished product, depending on their skill.

InterFlight Studio, founded in 2003 by Oscar and Yvette Garcia, features "everything aviation" fine art and furniture. This bench is from a McDonnell Douglas DC-10.

"At InterFlight Studio we find materials, shapes and stance on certain parts that have artistic tension even before they are converted by us, or other designers into works of art," Yvette Garicia says. "Most parts were found at an aircraft recycling center in South Florida."

This lounge chair was created from a Boeing 727, also by InterFlight Studio.

"The challenge for the artist remains to respect the parts original intend and laws of physics and flight and the final artistic dimensions created between the work and the viewer," says Yvette Garcia.

Consisting of 179 individual blades, Intrepid Design created this table from a Rolls-Royce Spey 250 gas turbine jet engine. Intrepid is based in Luton, England.

This dining room table, by Intrepid Design, is 74 cm high with a diameter of 219 cm. Made from a Rolls-Royce Boeing 747 engine, the design is kept minimal to keep the blades the center of focus.

Intrepid design also makes chairs out of ejection seats, mirrors and clocks framed with fan blades, and cowling chairs.

Fallen Furniture might have gotten on the map with its Boeing 737 cowling chair, but it also creates light fixtures and fuselage wall art. This British Aerospace 146 exhaust lamp is more than 6 ft. tall.

The Hanger One Project is a break from furniture with a focus on art. A Boeing 737, supplied by Air Salvage International, was the canvas for a "grafitti-off" by two well-know artists. 

The project's site says, "The two artists worked day and night, fighting the weather for what seemed like a life-time, up and down on multiple pieces of access equipment, maneuvering around the plane and the uncomfortable awareness of leaking hydraulic fluid, was not part of our 5-A-Day!"

This reception desk was made from a GE CF6 and is about 235 cm in diameter on the inside, by SkyART.

SkyART also supplies aircraft and parts to customers like Turkish Airlines, Pegasus Airlines, and others for cabin mock-up trainings. When I asked Irmak Erol, sales director, if he could disclose who their "notable customers" were, he said he couldn't but did mention "a few Middle Eastern Kings are amongst them."

This office desk is made from an McDonnell Douglas MD-82 airplane door, by SkyART.

The final popular use for retired aircraft parts and bodies is the film industry. Many aircraft recycling companies provide complete aircraft set-ups for commercials and movie scenes.

This former Qantas trolley car, refurbished by AviArt Australia, features hand painted nose art which is identical to the same painted on a WWII aircraft.

Rob Pearson, founder, says, "Word spread wider and airline galley carts become popular as fellow airlines scrap these for newer models. I acquired them, add timber shelving, a top, weeks of machine polishing to the dented patina, and my art guy blings them with various art like WW2 nose art, football teams, nostalgic old airline liveries or photograph memories."

Coudamy Architectures created a light fixture for Flown Mobilier Airline from an Airbus A300.

From Coudamy's site: "These marvels of engineering with their ultra functional curves resulting from uncompromising technical research, are diverted from their original function in order to be integrated in our daily lives, thus offering them a second life."