Studio Tobias Røder

Studio Tobias Røder

Bringing out the beauty of Greenland

It’s a six-hour flight from Copenhagen to Greenland. When you get off the plane, the first thing you see is the bright white runway, the crisp sky, and the red-and-white flag of Greenland, which symbolizes the sun rising on the ice cap.

Around the turn of the millennium, when the official airline of Greenland hired a new CEO, renewed its aging fleet, and changed its name from Grøndlandsfly to Air Greenland, we were asked to come up with their new visual identity. We wanted to convey the wonder that is Greenland, and so we decided to cover their entire fleet in bright metallic red. The only problem was, since the glistening in the paint comes from metal particles, doing so would add half a ton to the average aircraft. However, with the help of British engineers we managed to develop a light-weight metallic paint by substituting metal particles for carbon fibers.

Done in collaboration with Peter Bundgaard Rützou.