Review: American Airlines Flagship Lounge New York JFK

The American Airlines Flagship Lounge concept is quite new. These provide an upscale experience for international First Class and Business Class passengers, as well as those flying the premium transcontinental routes from New York to Los Angeles and San Francisco.

I previously visited the Flagship lounge in Chicago and you can see the food on offer in that lounge here. When visiting New York, I had much more time to spend taking pictures, so you will get a full review of the lounge below.

Flagship Lounge Entrance

Immediately after security are the lifts to the lounges, which means no having to walk for miles to find them. Once at the top, you are directed to the lounge itself.

When I arrived, it was around 8am so the lounge was quite quiet. This meant I could run around taking photos of everything without disturbing people.

Flagship Lounge Decor

While the lounge is a relatively large space, it is broken up quite nicely by division into different sections. When you enter, immediately to your right is the food service area, but we won’t look at that just yet. On the left are the toilets and the areas with televisions.

A bar is situated in the centre of the space with black bubble lighting which is quite striking. Having a lighting feature over the bar is also something British Airways do in their lounges. There is plenty of seating, but the most popular ones are those facing the windows looking out over the tarmac. It took me a little while to score one of those but I was happy when I did.

Flagship Lounge Breakfast

There is a large variety of buffet food available and after sampling various options, I can report that the quality of the food is excellent also. At breakfast time, there are options for just about everyone.

You must think I have a great memory to remember all the dishes, right? RIGHT?! No, I just have no shame. After taking a photo of each dish, I went back the other way taking a photo of each sign so I’d be able to describe them correctly here.

Quiet Rooms, Work Areas and More Seating

An entire room is devoted to being quiet. Here mobile phones are not allowed and people are expected to sit down and shut up. A careful creep inside found one or two people asleep and the sound of silence prevailing.

Back out in the real world, the lounge features some interesting pod type things where you can do some work at a desk yet remain connected to the overall vibe. Having so many different kinds of seating could feel a little schizophrenic however it works well together. It’s that division of space again, you see.

Flagship Tea and Coffee

You can get your coffee from a machine which has a touch screen with little pictures of what you may want. This saves having a barista service like they do in the Qantas Business Lounges in Australia.

Tea drinkers are spoiled for choice with English Breakfast, Imperial Oolong, Earl Grey and Green tea to name but a few. You also have at least four different kinds of milk to choose from, none of which seems to come directly from a cow.

Fancy a Bloody Mary?

On Sunday, the alcoholic drinks such as Champagne, wine and so on don’t appear until 10am in the Flagship Lounge. While the main bar was stocked, in another area was a Bloody Mary station.

Any kind of Bloody Mary would be able to be made here. Had I noticed this had been set out, I would have had one but as it was I was on my way out when I spotted it. Drats!

Soft Drinks and Toilets

Well, they kinda go hand in hand, don’t they? Have one and you’re likely to need to visit the other. Certainly not a case where I can use the words vice versa though!

Toilet facilities are white, white, white and also kept quite clean. There are shower facilities in the Flagship lounges however I did not visit them on this occasion.

Champagne and Wine

Self-service Champagne is available which is Delamotte. In addition, there is red wine called Educated Guess, Les Doux Tours Sauvignon Blanc, Talbott’s Kali Hart Chardonnay and some other things besides.

The Champagne was fine and I had a couple of glasses of it. Here are four more views of the lounge from different angles to show you the rest of what it is like. Wireless Internet is available in the lounge and it is fast and free. This is so important when travelling away from home and is one thing the United States always gets right. Plenty of charging points are also available to support lots of device use.

Flagship Lounge Lunch Time

Around midday all the breakfast food is removed from the buffet station and in its place comes the lunch offering. Once again I did my pictures of all the food, followed by all the signs.

Overlooking the errors on some of the signs, the food presented is pretty excellent. I sampled a little bit of this and that, but did manage to have all three desserts twice. So I have a sweet tooth, sue me!

Overall Thoughts

American Airlines Flagship Lounge in New York is an excellent place to spend time between flights. You want for nothing when it comes to food, drink, Wi-Fi, quiet areas, places to work, places to eat or just to sit and watch the world go by.

Importantly, the lounge never felt crowded, even when it became busier around lunch time. I can’t stress enough how much a busy lounge just feels like the terminal with free food and drink thrown in. Lounges should be calmer and more relaxing otherwise what is the point?

Have you visited the Flagship Lounge in New York? What did you think? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.

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