Virgin Australia opens Gold Coast airport lounge this week

Update | Virgin Australia's Gold Coast lounge is now open – see our article for all the details plus plenty of photos.

Previous | Virgin Australia will open its Gold Coast Airport lounge this Wednesday May 30.

Australian Business Traveller will be attending the media launch on Wednesday morning, and going on past experience we'd expect the lounge will open its doors to the public in the afternoon.

The Gold Coast lounge will seat around 135 travellers in 675 square metres of space, making it slightly smaller than its Brisbane sibling.

While the entry will be on the ground floor of the airport the lounge itself will be located upstairs, nestled between gates 1 through 3, affording a good view of the airfield.

The new Gold Coast lounge sports a similar contemporary design and furnishings to the Melbourne and Brisbane lounges, and is divided into the same functional zones to cater for travellers ranging from 'short stay' passengers – who arrive in the lounge with little time before their flight – through to a workspace 'hub', a socialising bar area and a quiet zone.

Three types of lounges

The lounge is modelled on what Virgin Australia chief John Borghetti described to Australian Business Traveller earlier this year as the airline's "core" lounge.

"There are effectively three (Virgin Australia lounge) models that you're looking at" Borghetti says.

"One is the model that you'll see in Brisbane and in Melbourne. Let's call that the core model. Then you've got the regional model, which is your Mackay-type lounge. It's a very good lounge, and it certainly beats any other regional lounge around."

"And then of course, the Sydney one, as you'd expect, will be very much a flagship lounge. It'll be quite a large lounge, but it won't feel large."

That Sydney lounge, which is currently undergoing its own transformation, will open by year's end as a two-level lounge that's tipped to include an exclusive lounge area for members of Virgin Australia's Invite+ program which will take on the Qantas Chairman's Lounge.