Hella Jongerius at the United Nations
The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ commissioned interior for the North Delegates Lounge
Sixty years after the United Nations was established in New York in 1951, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs commissioned a new interior for the North Delegates’ Lounge, and appointed Hella Jongerius as its Head Designer. Jongerius assembled a team of leading Dutch creatives to collaborate on this illustrious project: the architect Rem Koolhaas, the graphic designer Irma Boom, and the theorist Louise Schouwenberg. Together, they worked on an interior that would mix classical Dutch furniture with emblematic international pieces, as well as new creations designed especially for the lounge.
Used as a meeting place for thousands of policymakers and diplomats, the North Delegates’ Lounge has always played a key role in the way the United Nations work. As an informal counterpoint to the spaces where conversations are official and recorded, the lounge is a space where encounters can occur on a more human level — allowing for diplomatic ‘friendships to be born, or renewed, and animosities to be assuaged’ (Jongerius).
The Dutch team, with Jongerius at its helm, considered this context deeply, and focused on delivering a space that could provide functionality, comfort, timelessness, and the safeguarding of privacy in diplomatic encounters.
The pieces Jongerius made for the space — the ‘Sphere table’, the ‘UN Lounge Chair’ and the ‘Knots & Beads Curtain’ — precisely reflect these qualities.
The Sphere Table
The ‘Sphere table’ is a tribute to the clean lines and natural, solid materials of Jongerius’ native Holland. The tables’ half-spheres, made of tinted acrylic, allow users to maintain privacy and create a warm and inviting workspace.
UN Lounge Chairs
Thanks to the six shades of blue that make up the UN Lounge Chairs — petrol blue, indigo, iris, midnight blue, slate blue and ocean blue — Jongerius utilises colour as a unit and a whole, endowing the space with a strong chromatic coherence. Jongerius also thought of the chairs as hyperfunctional work tools: a leather handle and two small wheels placed at the bottom make them particularly easy objects to move.
Knots and Beads Curtain
Finally, the sculptural ‘Knots & Beads Curtain’ is hung tight in front of the slanted windows of the East façade. Composed of 30,000 partly glazed porcelain beads, the curtain carries a plethora of references, not least the maritime history of the Netherlands. Handcrafted by Dutch craftsmen, the beads literally bring a piece of the country into the United Nations, and metaphorically evoke the union of myriad unique and different entities.
© Frank Oudeman
