Danger: Cute overload

Are you a drab, lifeless airline? Do you ever feel you slip past people on the landing strip, without turning a head?

Well, you need an Extreme Airline Makeover!

Just look at our before and after example. Take one fairly staid Asian carrier, Taiwan's EVA Air. Give it a direct injection of quirkiness and SHAZAM! Before you know it, you're winning friends and earning designer praise, faster than you can say "Hello Kitty".

Thanks to a frighteningly high cute factor, EVA Air’s two Hello Kitty jets have earned praise from passengers to journalists alike. In awarding the carrier “Best Livery” by Wallpaper* magazine (right) in January. Travel editor at Wallpaper* Jeroen Bergmans said of the jets, which have served routes from Taiwan to Japan since late 2006,

“Although airlines do try to be innovative in terms of design and luxury, often their first class lounges end up looking bland, corporate and at best like a modern furniture showroom. The food in first and business class may be Michelin-starred, the service of a very high standard and the seats may convert into beds, but it is rare to come across a product that is fun and quirky. The EVA Air Hello Kitty Jet is camp, crazy and quintessentially Asian and will also keep those wailing children entertained throughout the flight!”

While there's no doubt EVA's two-jet makeover has turned heads, we wonder if it would have legs across the airline.

Whether sustaining a cute factor like themed Hello Kitty food onboard would be healthy for longhaul travel could be another question...