Back in December I wrote that based on local documents that had been uncovered the current The Club space at the Phoenix airport’s terminal 4 B concourse would be expanded and turned into two lounges, an Escape Lounge and an American Express Centurion lounge. I’ve been tracking progress on this project for over a year.
The Phoenix City Council approved a contract with MAG USA Lounge Management, a subsidiary of the UK’s Manchester Airport Group, for the 9532 square foot joint lounge.
While it’s a lot more lounge space than the 2500 square feet offered by The Club at PHX today, and Escape lounges aren’t usually large, this will be the second-smallest Centurion lounge after Seattle.
- American Express Centurion lounges currently open are Dallas Fort-Worth, Las Vegas, Miami, New York LaGuardia, San Francisco, Seattle, Houston, Philadelphia and Hong Kong.
- Denver, New York JFK, Los Angeles, Charlotte, and London Heathrow were already confirmed to be in progress.
American Express is now confirming details of the Phoenix lounges, and providing renderings. They say the lounges will open “in the coming months” which they say means “expected to open this year.”
The two lounges will have a shared entrance with separate reception spaces. American Express Platinum and Centurion customers can access both, while the Escape lounge will also be pay-in. The Escape Lounge is not expected to be Priority Pass-accessible.
Centurion Lounge and The Club Entrance, Credit: American Express
The Centurion lounge will feature a shower, as well as complimentary bar and buffet plus “semi-private and dedicated work areas.”
Credit: American Express
Credit: American Express
Credit: American Express
Credit: American Express
Credit: American Express
Credit: American Express
The Escape Lounge will also offer a shower, as well as complimentary bar and buffet, plus:
- “Silent digital library, with noise cancelling Bose headphones and free access to over 7,000 publications from over 120+ countries courtesy of PressReader”
- “Children activity packs, including Escape Lounge’s Kids Crew puzzles, coloring book and crayons”
Escape lounges are quite nice. I was super-impressed by the Escape Lounge at the Reno airport. It was stylish with surprisingly good food (though no restrooms inside the lounge).
Having both spaces will help on crowding, though this is a small lounge. It’s more lounge space than currently available from The Club Priority Pass lounge in the terminal, which I’ve used when flying American Airlines. In addition to American, terminal 4 houses Air Canada, British Airways, Condor, Southwest, Volaris, and WestJet. I’ll be most interested to see the food options, because I can imagine picking items off of each buffet for the best of both.
Why aren’t they just making one big Centurion lounge? I guess the Escape lounge will “sell” access to airlines who don’t have their own lounge in the airport.
Big improvement and a great space for plane watching. BA users “The Club” for their flights to London for business and first class passengers. I wonder if they will continue to do so or use the AA Admirals Clubs in terminal 4. There are two large ones in B1 and A1 concourses and a smaller one in the A2 concourse. They were some of the first to be remodeled after the merger the “big two” are very nice, the smaller one. . .not so much. Anyone flying internationally will be right by this club and it’s just a sky bridge walk from the LUV side of terminal 4.
Sky Harbor continues to improve and impress. DL and UA also have clubs in Terminal 3 and 2 respectively and UA will put a club in when they move to the newly expanded and remodeled terminal 3 next spring (Terminal 2 will be shut down and demolished). Hope AA and other continue the international expansion and with the new lounge from AMEX my guess is more service is on the way.