SWISS First Class Lounge Zürich, Concourse A

Despite departing in first class, I had decided to take the train for the one stop from Oerlikon to Zürich Airport. Actually, just like in Frankfurt, the first class experience will probably be better when arriving by car, as you can pull up right at the first class entrance of the terminal and only have to walk a few steps until you arrive at the lounge. When arriving by train (again, this is similar in FRA), it is necessary to walk quite a few hundred meters from the airport railway station to the check-in area or lounge, respectively. I decided to already make my way to the airport shortly after noon, as I were the only person in our office and I was getting hungry, so I thought I might as well spend the time in the lounge and have lunch there.

The new A FCL also has a landside entrance, which is one of the features that were received with lots of praise. When coming from the check-in area 1, you walk right past the normal boarding pass check, up the stairs at the end of the hall, and you’ll be right at the landside reception of the lounge.



I wasn’t exactly sure which of my three boarding passes I would actually have to present, and chose to present the one taking me from ZRH to FRA. The receptionist looked at the boarding pass, and then, with a confused look on her face, asked whether I had any kind of VIP status or the like. I explained that I would continue my journey in first class, and she told me that the F boarding pass needed to be scanned first. After scanning the boarding passes, she told me to wait a few seconds as she would look up whether my flight would leave from a terminal or remote gate. However, it was still too early (and we both suspected that it would be a terminal gate), so she told me to just keep an eye on the information board and report to someone should the gate turn out to be a remote one - they still provide limousine service from the lounge to remote stands, as they always have.

I then proceeded through the door towards the first class security check, which is located right in front of the main entrance of the lounge (where you’ll also end up when coming into the lounge from the airside gallery of the terminal). This is definitely a great feature, as there were three Kantonspolizisten just waiting for me, booting up their screening devices and all greeted me in a very friendly way. The screening process itself was as painless as it usually is when no problems arise, and I made my way into the actual lounge after each of the police officers had wished me a good trip.

As you would expect for an early Saturday afternoon, the lounge was almost completely deserted, with only 3 other people sitting inside (two of which left shortly after I arrived). After getting a first overview across the lounge, I put my stuff down at the far corner of the sofa area and proceed to the restaurant area for lunch.







The menu itself seems to be almost identical to the one found in the E lounges, with an important difference being a (very small) self-serve area behind the central bar where you cannot only help yourself to a soft drink but also grab a few (tiny) bites.







As the beef tartar has always been exceptional in the E lounge, I decided to also order it on that day, followed by the falafel and accompanied by some still water. While I had recently been complaining about the level of service in the E lounge, it was different in the A lounge this time. I actually had the feeling of the lounge to be overstaffed, particularly for a saturday afternoon. There were 4 staff members behind the bar, and another 3 in the kitchen, and despite there were only two guests in the lounge at that time, they seemed quite busy, constantly rummaging in the box containing the cutlery, sorting plates and so on, which, of course, caused quite some noise. Additionally, the people in the kitchen (which has a large window facing the lounge restaurant were talking and laughing quite loudly, so the entire atmosphere in the lounge was actually not really calm - at some point, they even started vacuuming the floor.

When the food was served, the tartar was excellent once again, while I found the falafel to be a bit dry and salty (they obviously try to maintain the falafel as a vegan option while I actually prefer to have a yoghurt sauce to go along with it, as it minimizes the risk that the falafel are actually too dry.





After finishing the meal, I went around to explore the lounge a bit. First of all, I have to say that the lounge is really small, and I would say that it is actually considerably smaller than the old FCL A, and maybe half the size of the E lounge. Adding to that, the central bar occupies most of the space, and the empty area around the entrance also „wastes“ quite some space, so the rest of the lounge actually looks and feels a bit cramped (at least if compared to the FCL E). As the central bar is quite dominant, it also feels a bit like you’re always in plain sight, particularly when sitting in the restaurant.









The most private space is probably the small sofa corner at the far right end of the lounge, where I had chosen to settle down. When sitting on those sofas, you are actually looking down onto the main concourse of check-in 1. While it is definitely not a bad thing to watch the hustle and bustle downstairs from the comfort of the lounge, there are virtually no outside views from the lounge, even though they are advertising something like „overview over the airport area“ (which is true, but it’s just the inside area). Leading up to the sofa corner is a row of 3 „living room“ seating areas similar to those in E, with four armchairs and a TV each. Across the aisle by the windows (which are, as I said, looking down onto the concourse) there are three groups of two armchairs facing each other. This relaxation area is divided from the bar by the same wooden semi-dividers that can also be found in the E lounge (and as they are open, you can still see and hear everything that is going on at the bar.











At the far wall of the lounge, adjacent to the relaxation area and located directly behind (and facing) the bar, there’s the restaurant area with a number of tables for two persons each. At the end of the row of tables, you can find the kitchen window where the food will be prepared and picked up by the waiters. If you turn left in front of the kitchen, there’s a small area with two refrigerators where they keep soft drinks, beer and a very small selection of tiny bites (very similar to what was available in the former FCL A).





While I appreciate that you can help yourself to at least something (I already mentioned that in one of the previous installments), I actually miss typical lounge snacks like peanuts or sweets. The only thing in this respect that could be found around the lounge was a bowl of Lindor chocolate balls on the bar.

When you complete you tour around the bar, you’ll end up at a row of office cubicles, and a very small quiet room with two reclining chairs in a semi-dark environment. The washrooms are located behind the office cubicles, and they look similar to what you can also find in the concourse E business and senator lounges. I didn’t have the chance to look at the shower rooms, but I suspect that they are similar to what you can find in the FCL E.





I then proceeded to the upper level of the lounge, where the conference room and the smoking room are located, as well as the exit you need to take if you get driven to your plane by car.

While they advertise the conference room to have views across the apron, this is actually correct - however, the conference room is located on the inside of the building, and the corridor to the limousine checkpoint is actually leading past the conference room on the apron side - this means, you still have to look „through“ the corridor when looking out from the conference room.



The smoking room is relatively small, with only 8 seats and a small whisky bar. Actually, there should be an outside terrace that is accessible from the smoking room, but that was locked when I came there. Peeking through the openings on the otherwise etched windows, I could see that the outside part didn’t look particularly appealing, and they had placed a lot of construction stuff there (probably from the refurbishment of the business and senator lounges).









During my stay in the lounge, I was mostly the only person there. However, every time I would leave the sofa corner (where nobody from staff could actually see me) in order to walk around or visit the bathrooms, somebody would come over shortly afterwards and ask whether I needed anything. In the end, I declined the offer every time, as I was quite happy with my bottle of water from the upper level and the odd glass of whisky I sampled from the smoking room.

Around 4pm, the lounge got relatively full (at least comparing to what had been the number of people inside before), and there were actually lots of families around (HON circle members can actually bring their entire family, regardless of the number of children, as long as they don’t exceed a certain age). However, it was soon time to board from gate A74, and I approached the attendant at the airside reception whether it would actually be possible to leave the lounge through the limousine corridor (you’ll end up at the entrance to the former first class lounge) which she confirmed was possible (and can save you a few steps as you don’t have to do the slightly circumstantial walk from the airport center gallery to concourse A). When I proceeded down the corridor, I was quite surprised to find another desk staffed by an agent at the end of this corridor. When I explained that I just wanted to leave the lounge without being picked up, she looked oddly at me, but said she would open the door and summon the elevator for me (which is done by the push of a button underneath the desk), so obviously, you cannot leave the lounge unattended. I wonder how this would work for limousine rides to remote gates, where they actually need to notify you that your flight is ready for boarding.





I left the lounge, rode the elevator down and walked the length of the concourse towards gate A74.

Verdict

While the lounge itself has a very nice design, it’s main selling point is probably the ease with which you can get airside through the dedicated security checkpoint. As the lounge is really small, I cannot yet imagine how it would look like when lots of HON Circle members and arriving first class guests would use it before their connecting flights all across Europe. And just like many reviewers who have already been here (or even attended the pre-opening event), I find it relatively problematic that everything is centered around the bar. The amount of noise emerging from that (and the semi-open kitchen) is quite considerable, and somehow, it constantly feels like you’re under surveillance by the staff (which might be good service-wise, but suboptimal when it comes to privacy). The new A lounge can definitely not hold up to it’s older sibling in E, but I would say that it’s a nice addition to the lounge landscape here at ZRH, particularly as the old FCL A has never really been on the top lists of international airport lounges.