Restaurant Airways: Boeing 737 transformed into a restaurant in China

A different kind of fine-dining restaurant in China which is located entirely within a retired Boeing 737 have made many folks amazed around the globe.

The appropriately dubbed the Airplane Restaurant has been bought and established by a famous Chinese tycoon, who has opened it for public Wuhan province of central China. The owner of the unique restaurant Mr. Li Yang told the reporters that it cost him around 35 million yuan ( $6 million) to buy the Boeing and then refitting the jet as a restaurant.

Li Yang is widely known as an ambitious businessman who named his restaurant the Lily Airways; the restaurant is a modern Western-style fine dining space with a unique twist that has generated immense press and publicity of Mr. Yang.

The average Boeing 737 when fully functional has the capacity of 128 passengers, however, the designers had to modify the interior of the aircraft to fit Li’s demands for his dining area; the restaurant can now host 70 guests at any given time.

Mr. Yang admits that the idea of turning a plane into a restaurant is not his own, he talked about his visit to Sweden a few years ago where he had seen a jet transformed into a dinning space which inspired him for his own ambitious plan for Lily Airways.

The waitresses who work in the Lily Airways have been carefully selected according to the standards of the airline. The height and demeanour of the waiting staff have been a top priority; in order to work in the restaurant, the female staff had to be taller than 5ft 4 in, while the male staff has to be at least 5ft 7in tall. After meeting the pre-requisites, all members of staff have to go through a detailed and vigorous training in etiquette and hospitality.

The plane transformed by the Li Yang is, in fact, a decommissioned craft purchased form an Indonesian Airline Batavia Air; the company went through a rough patch and was declared bankrupt in 2013. The Boeing 737 is reportedly 28 years old and had a number of previous ownerships including Mandala Airlines and British Midland Airlines.

After making the purchase the next challenge was to transport the complete aircraft form Indonesia to China. The plane was meticulously taken apart into several pieces over a period of four months, which were then transported to China mainland by sea.