The Room FX

Design Objective

Achieving the objective of maximising comfort and space, aligning to the original ‘The Room’ product, is a task made more difficult when the new product is installed on the Boeing B787 aircraft type, which is much smaller in width than the B777. This meant Acumen were required to re-think the product from the ground up, whilst maintaining the essence of the original - enhancing the exceptional passenger experience with an all new intuitive and minimal seat mechanism.

The Challenge

The completely bespoke design of ‘The Room FX’ gave the opportunity to re-think every element of the suite, from the plan shape, to the mechanisms - truly designing the space around the passenger’s needs. Through ANA’s observations, Acumen could understand how the existing ‘The Room’ product is used in flight and look again at the most critical needs of ANA’s passengers.

With this understanding of in-flight comfort, and the requirement to keep a consistent, seamless passenger experience with ‘The Room’ on the B777, the biggest challenge was to maximise the dimensions of the new ‘The Room FX’ suite for the narrower B787 fuselage. The new simplified seat mechanism (where just the leg rest deploys to create the bed surface) was created to optimise space in the cabin, allowing the curved backrest shapes of forward and aft facing seats to interlock with each other. Through this development, more comfort positions are available to the ANA passenger as the ergonomically shaped backrest is always available to rest against. The in-line exposed double doors increased space saving further, moving away from the pocket doors that are stowed back to back on the B777 version of ‘The Room’. The addition of a manually operated forward & aft sliding centre screen saved further space, allowing the ottoman areas to be maximised for the passenger.

On the surface, the materials used in the new suite remain consistent with ‘The Room’, however due to engineering and maintenance concerns, they have been improved with more durable alternatives. These were created through specialist shared knowledge and in-depth collaborations with material suppliers.

The Solution

Acumen developed this refined evolution with a series of iterative mock ups to ensure that the original objectives of enhancing comfort and space were being met. To complement the understated seat mechanism and new levels of comfort, other major improvements followed. The seat width and the bed area were cleverly maximised (to be in line with ‘The Room’ B777 proportions) to allow greater freedom of movement when seated and when sleeping. The side furniture was increased to create a larger, accessible surface that allows the passenger to use the suite in the way they choose. When combined with the existing CMF palette (a collaboration between Acumen and Japanese architect Kengo Kuma), enhanced for durability, this contributed to a considered minimalist approach in a sophisticated calming environment - elevating the passenger experience and allowing passengers the space and clarity to truly focus on what is important to them whilst in their private cabins.