Aviation geeks will be in their element as it has emerged that Cathay Pacific is painting an iconic ‘retro livery’ on three of its modern aircraft, including the Hong Kong-based carrier’s flagship Airbus A350, to mark its 80th anniversary.
Eager plane spotters captured the first photos of one of the aircraft being painted with the special livery around a week ago, but now, there are clearer than ever images of the A350 on the tarmac with the paint scheme.
Cathay Pacific is painting three jets with retro liveries
Founded originally as a cargo airline at the end of the Second World War in 1946, Cathay Pacific will be celebrating its 80th anniversary in 2026. A lot has changed over the decades, not least the Hong Kong-based carrier’s aircraft livery, which adorns every plane in its fleet.
As is becoming increasingly common amongst airlines celebrating major anniversary milestones, Cathay Pacific has decided to paint three of its current aircraft in a special ‘retro livery’ which is affectionately known as the ‘lettuce leaf sandwich.’
The livery is especially iconic as it flew during a time of rapid expansion for Cathay Pacific. Introduced in 1971, the livery became a defining look for the airline and lasted for 23 years before it was finally replaced with a new look.
But now, the livery is making a return. Plane spotters have caught behind-the-scenes photos of a Cathay Pacific Airbus A350 in a hangar in Xiamen, mainland China, with what definitely appears to be the ‘lettuce leaf sandwich’ livery.
The only difference between the original and new version is the addition of a bold ’80’ painted towards the aft of the fuselage to signify the airline’s anniversary.
It’s not, however, just the one aircraft that will get the special anniversary paint scheme. Along with the Airbus A350, Cathay Pacific is reportedly applying the retro livery to a Boeing 777-300 passenger aircraft and a Boeing 747 cargo plane.
All three aircraft are currently on the ground in Xiamen, so we should receive official confirmation from the airline very soon.
The history of Cathay Pacific’s livery
In the early years, Cathay Pacific had a fairly simple livery which comprised a dark blue nose and stripe running along the length of the fuselage, along with a dark blue tailfin, and the word ‘Cathay’ in an oval in the center.
The ‘lettuce leaf sandwich’ livery
In 1971, however, Cathay Pacific made a big departure from its dark blue color choice in favor of the rich green hue that would grace the sides of its aircraft for more than two decades.
The tailfin was painted green with two white horizontal stripes, and a green stripe also ran all the way from the nose to the vertical stabilizer at the aft of the plane.
The livery became particularly famous because of photos of Cathay’s Boeing 747s landing at Kai Tak Airport, a notoriously difficult airport to land at that required planes to fly a low altitude over high-rise apartment buildings in densely populated Kowloon.
The landor ‘brushwing’ livery
A decade on from British Airways introducing its own Landor livery, Cathay Pacific brought in the same design company to reimagine its look. Landor Associates reinterpreted Cathay’s green colorway with muted tones and the addition of a new ‘brushwing’ design on the tailfin.
Present-day livery
In 2015, Cathay Pacific unveiled an updated version of its ‘brushwing’ livery that still serves as the airline’s livery. This was very much an evolution rather than a revolution, which saw red accents removed from the livery and a cleaner aesthetic to match more modern trends.
The time the painters made a big mistake
After Cathay Pacific introduced its latest livery, the airline had to embark on a huge mission to repaint every aircraft in its fleet. Of course, repainting an aircraft is no mean feat, although aircraft painters have carefully prepared templates to follow to make sure that every aircraft looks exactly the same.
That is, at least, the idea.
In 2018, a Boeing 777-300 went into the hangar for its new look livery and came out missing the ‘F’ in ‘Cathay Pacific.’
To make matters worse, this wasn’t the only aircraft that had been repainted with a very obvious mistake. A couple of years before this mistake, one plane had the brushwing logo on its tailfin painted the wrong way round.
