A first-class-only lounge at Taipei Taoyuan that's private, attentive, and largely forgettable — with standout coffee but little else to remember.
They should just gut the place and start all over. It looks unfathomably depressing.
For the East Asian market, their offerings do reflect the best Taiwan has to offer, and its quietness is reflective of the high prices, so even if one could afford it, they may not have the appetite to book at those crazy First Class fares.
https://youtu.be/xt88bgoxC6k?t=765
Great review! Btw I fly to/from Taipei multiple times per year and am still sometimes confused by the layout of the terminal as well.
This looks terrible. A combination of institutional office vibe with a corner for "socializing" and the 2010s-American Airlines' hospital aesthetic of its lounge decor. I would expect a lot more for a brand that is noisy about its offering. Nothing there screams premium or luxury.
I’m not familiar with TPE but is the reason they don’t use the VIP terminal related to immigration processing?
@ JustinB -- That's a great question, maybe others can chime in? It does seem that parts of the lounge are located past immigration, so perhaps that's a consideration. Then again, I imagine most Starlux first class passengers can enter Taiwan pretty seamlessly.
I asked this before on the preview article for this lounge, but I dont think you answered. You originally called Starlux F one of the "most consistent" first class products in the world, or something to that effect, in the first preview (LAX-TPE). After the F lounge experience, would you still call it that? This lounge seems like a pretty large speed bump in the whole experience, considering price paid and the onboard soft product. First world problems, I know.
@ GuruJanitor -- Sorry I didn't answer the last question. I think your question was in reference to this comment, which I made:
"After Air France, I’d argue that Starlux has the most consistently excellent first class ground experience of any airline in the world, in terms of the consistency with which you’re looked after."
Perhaps I should've phrased this better, but I think the point stands. I'm not saying it's the best first class ground experience in the world in absolute terms, but instead it's the most consistent in terms of end-to-end service. I can't think of any other airlines (beyond Air France and Starlux) that escort you the entire way on both arrival and departure at all stations.
To be clear, this lounge doesn't even crack my list of the top 10 in the world. But my point is simply that the airline consistently looks after you, and that's something to be said for that in terms of minimizing the hassle of the ground experience.
This was also your opportunity to visit the Galactic J lounge in Terminal 2 — since you hadn’t seen that before (though you did see the much tinier T1 lounge) — unless there was no time for it… And did your flight use the new T3 gates?
@ Proximanova -- Well this is part of that Galactic Lounge. I was able to briefly walk around the business class area, but a) the top level was largely under construction, so it wasn't really practical to review and b) the lounge was packed, partly because the construction going on. So unfortunately I'll have to save a review of the business class section for next time.
If you think this is bad, just wait till Elon Musk designs his first class lounge for spacex flights….
Should've ordered an Asian dish instead of fish en papillote, you're in Taipei after all.
Ten Forward vibes.