Air Austral is the flag carrier of Réunion, a French overseas department in the Indian Ocean, operating scheduled services to metropolitan France, South Africa, Thailand, India and regional destinations. The airline’s current visual identity, introduced in September 2014, centers on a stylized double “A” monogram that forms a heart shape.
Design and History
Air Austral unveiled its new logo and livery on 22 September 2014, as part of a broader brand refresh that also included new cabin products, a new sonic identity and a communication campaign [1]. The airline invested approximately 500,000 euros in the new image and products [2].
The new identity was created by the agency Circus, which won the consultation for the project [3]. According to Circus, the agency conducted workshops and qualitative research before developing the concept, finding that “the most precious asset of the brand is its people.” The identity was built on the two “A”s of Air Austral forming a heart, “thus expressing the human values of the brand” [4].
The logo retained the double “A” motif that had accompanied Air Austral since its creation in 1990, but rotated it slightly to emphasize the heart shape, described as a symbol of the company’s attachment to Réunion and its people [5]. The airline described the new mark as “modernized and stylized” [6].
Alongside the logo, the livery changed to a “eurowhite” style with the Air Austral name displayed in larger characters on the fuselage and the new logo on the forward section [7]. The tail fins of the aircraft were decorated with large photographs of Réunion landscapes taken by photographer Serge Gélabert, including the Mafate cirque, Trou de Fer waterfall, the volcano and the wild south coast [7]. The first aircraft in the new colors arrived in late November 2014, with the full fleet transformation scheduled to continue until June 2015 [8].
Meaning and Symbolism
The heart formed by the interlocking “A”s is the central symbolic element of the Air Austral logo. According to the agency that designed it, the heart expresses the human values of the brand [4]. Local press at the time of the launch described the heart shape as “a way of signifying the company’s attachment to the inhabitants of the island” [9].
The broader identity also reinforced the airline’s Réunionnais roots through the photographic imagery on the aircraft tails, described as “portes drapeaux” (flagships) for the island’s landscapes [3]. The cabin redesign extended the local theme into the three classes, with the sugar cane flower for Club Austral, the palm for Confort and the vanilla flower for Loisir [3].
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