Month: February 2012

Proud as a Dutchman to see Dutch designer Hella Jongerius of Jongeriuslab was instrumental in re designing some chairs for the UN North Delegates Lounge of the UN headquarters in NYC. However the brown blue color scheme might be close to the original 50ies color schemes, but doesn’t fit quite with my preferred color schemes.

The U.N. headquarters were originally completed in 1952 and financed in part by donations from the member states. Between 2009 and 2013 the buildings are being renovated. The Netherlands have adopted the re-design of the North Delegates’ Lounge. After a selection process, in which four Dutch design teams competed with each other, the team assembled by Hella Jongerius with Rem Koolhaas/OMA, Architect

Irma Boom, Graphic Designer
, Gabriel Lester, Artist and Louise Schouwenberg, Theorist

 was selected.
In 1952 the 11 architects of the U.N. Headquarters, including Wallace K. Harrison, Le Corbusier, and Oscar Niemeyer, have cooperated to create a superb work. The Dutch team, aware of this tradition, has also worked together on all its plans. The various interventions are linked to specific names, whose voices were prevalent in the final designs. However, until the final moment all interventions have been open to debate and questioning by all the other members of the team. The result is a multidisciplinary Gesamtkunstwerk that offers both old and new perspectives on ‘A Workshop For Peace’ (the expression architect Wallace K. Harrison used to describe both the design process of the U.N. buildings and the global organization itself).