We have witnessed a surge in architectural achievement across China with lots of adjectives – the highest, the fastest, the tallest, the longest – but the latest addition to the list is the most majestic. It was designed by the late architect Zaha Hadid and her Chinese partnership and it’s the second international airport in Beijing built in the shape of a star-fish. The building time was very short, a mere five years, and the magnificent Daxing international airport was officially opened on Wednesday, the 25th September just in time for the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

The amazing shape of the new Daxing International Airport includes a terminal billed as the world’s biggest at one million square metres (11 million square feet). It has four runways, with plans for as many as three more. One runway 01L/19R is 3,400 meters long. The other three (17L/35R, 17R/35L, and 11L/29R) are all 3,800 meters long.

The sleek and chic interior design is striking, thanks in part to the 8,000 distinctive rooftop windows that allow the natural rays in. Domestic and international airlines, including Air China, China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines, as well as KLM and Air France have said they will move all or part of their operations to the new airport.

The airport’s official name is Beijing Daxing International Airport or 北京大兴国际机场 in Chinese. IATA has given the airport the identifier PKX, meanwhile, ICAO has given Daxing the identifier ZBAD.

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