Delta’s ultraluxe first-class lounge attempts to win back its highest-paying customers, who can take a shower, have a massage, or get clothes steamed

At the Delta One Lounge, which is the airline’s biggest, most luxurious lounge yet, you can pass the time before your first-class flight by having a cocktail under Art Deco–inspired lights and gold-leaf ceilings reminiscent of Radio City Music Hall, eating steak tartare in an upscale restaurant, or taking a shower while a staff member steams your clothes and shines your shoes. 

The lounge will be open to customers departing or arriving in the Delta One cabin, the airline’s top premium tier of service, and showcases the latest effort of many airlines trying to generate higher sales from its wealthier or higher-spending customers while airfare overall dips. For Delta, which has been part of an arms race with rivals to lavish planes and airports with more premium features, the new lounge is a formidable luxury—and more are on the way. 

But even as the number of luxury crash pads in airports grows, the number of visitors welcomed there is shrinking—and that’s by design. After visitors to Delta’s Sky Club lounges hit record highs in 2022, Delta revised its policies to limit how often customers can visit lounges, mainly by making access more expensive. To win the arms race of lounges, it seems, an airline must excel at seemingly contradicting objectives: namely, to brand luxurious amenities as exclusive to high-spending customers, or “premium travelers,” while also being an accessible service the upper class can reach. 

First, though, a moment for the new space. Delta’s new lounge is bigger, more expensive, and more exclusive than the airline’s more standard Sky Club Lounge, and features a full-service bar, a wellness spa, a bakery, and a grab-and-go food counter. But services for the ticket holders who can access the lounge starts before they even enter the lounge’s doors: These travelers are first “greeted by a team of Elite Service agents providing white-glove service, with warm towels and light refreshments” at check-in, according to a statement by Delta. This fall, the check-in area will also feature a private security screening lane “for added exclusivity.” 

The lounge’s wellness area is equipped with nine reservable relaxation pods with full-body massage and nap chairs and skin care treatments, and there’s, of course, more. Adjacent to that area is the Serenity Lounge, which features specialty lamp lighting that can mimic “light colors affecting the body’s circadian rhythms, helping your body get acclimated to the time zone to which you will be flying.” 

Travelers can also freshen up at one of eight of the lounge’s shower suites, equipped with towels, bathrobes, and even a suite closet where valet staff will steam your clothes and shine your shoes while you shower. And for the workaholics, travelers can access eight individual soundproof booths and borrow computer monitors.  

While this new lounge is the first of its kind in terms of grandiosity, Delta plans to open more in Los Angeles and Boston later this year. Like its more scaled-down lounges, each Delta One Lounge location will include elements inspired by its host city too. In New York, those inspirations include fan-shaped mosaic tiles reminiscent of famous New York bars; a penny-round ceiling over the food counter inspired by Eero Saarinen, the architect who helped design the original JFK terminal; and lighting fixtures that evoke the overlapping strands of the Brooklyn Bridge. 

While the lounge’s level of luxury is certainly high, the share of people who can access the space seems to be shrinking. Delta saw a record number of visitors to its airport lounges in 2022, according to a NerdWallet report, which has since prompted the airline to roll out policies to limit lounge entry. 

In the complicated world of airline credit cards, perks, and exclusive memberships, there are many ways travelers can access airport lounges. While entry to the newest lounge requires a ticket on the carrier’s most expensive cabin, Delta’s other Sky Club lounges have softer barriers to entry—but even those have been getting more exclusive after Delta’s new policy changes. 

These lounges will be available to those who buy a first class ticket, as well as holders of Delta’s SkyMiles Reserve Business American Express Card, or those with elite membership status as a Sky Club card holder. However, both card options allow only limited lounge access of up to 15 days per year, with options to purchase additional days. 

In the last few years, Delta has been rolling out policies to limit members’ access to lounges. These include placing yearly caps on how many times people can visit lounges, barring those holding Basic Economy tickets from entering, and hiking fees for lounge access. Perhaps to be expected, customer outrage ensued. 

On a Reddit subpage, one user wrote, “I often take day trips for work, and if my meetings end early it’s nice to know I can go to the airport and sit in the lounge and work/eat while I wait for my flight. Now I’m limited to my Amex Platinum card, or opening a new one for more visits.” 

Others hypothesized the policies are meant to address overcrowding in Delta’s lounges, as another user wrote, “I fly out of JFK Terminal 4 a lot, and the last five or six times, there was a long line to get [in],” adding, “That lounge is clearly dealing with a crowding issue.” 

Other Reddit users seem to take issue with the heart of the matter: a wealthy customer base that’s spending a lot of money for exclusive perks they can’t access as easily.

“Why am I shocked at how many people are using airline perks to feel good about themselves? Delta is doing everyone a favor to help us realize that feeling of exclusivity by flying first class is not real,” another user wrote. 

In response to the customer backlash, last October Delta’s CEO Ed Bastian announced rollbacks on those policies aimed to make lounge access more accessible—but still not too accessible.

“We know how much you value the Delta Sky Club experience,” he wrote to customers in a letter, “and will increase access for Members with a Delta SkyMiles Reserve and Delta SkyMiles Reserve Business American Express Card.” 

The increased access includes five additional days per year for card members to visit the lounge, and shifting lounge access from visits to full days. Card members can earn unlimited lounge access after spending $75,000 on eligible cards, and can also purchase additional access for $50 per day if they run out of allotted visits. 

But the arms race of ultraluxe airport amenities still blazes, fueled by Americans rushing back to travel after the pandemic lull (and especially those who’ve nailed down work-from-home jobs). As airfare drops, though, many airlines have leaned into their wealthiest customer base for extra revenue. 

Many airlines, including American Airlines and United Airlines, offer lounges with characteristic features, like free food and booze, and comfortable chairs to relax away from crowded airport terminals, while more luxurious lounges are looming. United Airlines’ new club in Denver is a 35,000-square-foot, three-story lounge with two bars, one of which features tasting flights from Colorado breweries. American Express’s lounge in the busiest airport in the world in Atlanta opened in February, and features a backroom whiskey bar, a chef-curated menu, and 4,000 square feet of outdoor space where people can watch planes take off and touch down.