Virgin Atlantic’s new A350 leisure fleet

Last week Virgin Atlantic revealed the social space for the final five Airbus A350s on its order book. As the cabin layout of the final five will be tailored towards the airline’s leisure routes, there are a few changes from the mainline A350s, most notably a reduction of Upper Class seats from 44 to 16. The new aircraft type will be configured 16J 56W 325M including 45 economy seats designated “Economy Delight”

Virgin released a few teaser photos of the Upper Class social space, now officially named “The Booth”, which would appear to be a cozy nook located between door 1L and seat 1A featuring two leather upholstered banquet style seats, a small single leaf table, two Bluetooth audio jacks, and two 27” touchscreen TVs, perhaps suitable for a micro meeting or an intimate dinner for two.

Alongside “The Booth”, these aircraft will feature the airline’s latest Upper Class Safran Cirrus NG seats. The first aircraft of this type will be G-VEVE, named Fearless Lady, after Sir Richard Branson’s late mother Eve, is scheduled for delivery in December 2021. Lady Emmeline (G-VLIB), which is inspired by the leader of the women’s suffrage movement Emmeline Pankhurst, will follow in April 2022 with the final three aircraft set to be delivered by June 2023.

The new seat map has now been loaded on London Heathrow to Orlando flights from 1 January 2022.

We have been studying the new seat map and managed to reverse-engineer it as a draft layout. The usual caveats apply so please treat this as a highly indicative, work-in-progress representation.