Icelandair’s Hekla Aurora B757 turned into collector tags

Sometimes we have covered special airline liveries on this site. This has happened when these had some rather unique theme or stood out because of their exceptional beauty.

This was doubtlessly the case of Icelandair’s “Hekla Aurora”, a Boeing 757 which operated for over a decade wearing a livery inspired by the colours and patterns of the Northern Lights.

“Hekla Aurora” was actually one of two B757s liveries with which Icelandair was paying homage to the majesty of Icelandic nature (by the way, in 2023, I managed to fly on Hekla Aurora’s sister aircraft, the “Vatnajökull” B757, which takes inspiration from the eponymous Icelandic glacier!)

So, what was my surprise when I learned, the other day, that less than a year after its official retirement (which took place in October 2025), someone had found a new use for Hekla Aurora’s livery, or at least for parts of it (in a very literal sense!).

A company called Aviationtags has cut through the fuselage of Hekla Aurora, which was in storage at Lleida-Alguaire Airport, in Catalonia (you can check my CNN piece about this rather unique industrial airport here), in order to make many small meta tags for collectors.

There is, in fact, a whole industry dedicated to recycling and upcycling aircraft parts, which may end up as furniture or, as in this case, as a collector item, given the very unique aircraft they come from and the related vivid colour palette!

By the way, here is a picture of the fuselage cutting process, which I found quite interesting!

…and of the final product!