14.01.2008
New and surprising design in Pier B
Copenhagen Airport has just finished replacing all the furniture and carpeting in Pier B’s 12 gate lounges. This renovation is part of a large-scale investment in maintenance and improvements aimed at improving conditions for passengers. A contemporary design in new colour nuances was selected so that the award-winning Pier B will continue the airport's established tradition of beautiful Scandinavian design and architecture.
Copenhagen Airports has just finished replacing all furniture and carpeting at the twelve gates in Pier B, which roughly 5.4 million passengers at the airport see when they arrive at or leave Copenhagen Airport.
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The new interior is part of an ongoing maintenance process in which we are replacing and renovating fixtures and furnishings so Copenhagen Airport continues to offer quality, design and passenger friendliness. Our emphasis was on finding an interior for Pier B which combines wear-resistant and easy-to-clean materials with a contemporary and passenger-friendly furniture design. “This way, we ensure that we can continue to deliver high quality to the airport’s many users for many years to come,” says Kristian Slaarup Kongstad, head of Assets, Copenhagen Airports. |
Environmentally correct carpeting
A total of 807 lounge seats have been replaced in the 12 lounges of Pier B. The new lounge furniture also includes a number of light-coloured tables. Designers Anne-Mette Bartholin Jensen and Morten Ernst are behind the Orca brand of furniture, which is manufactured by Erik Jørgensen Møbelfabrik A/S. The seats also feature an extra wear-resistant upholstery material. With this new furniture design, the airport now shares a supplier with the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Copenhagen Opera House.
In addition to the new furniture, a total of 1839 square metres of new carpeting has been laid, in all the lounges.
The new carpeting was purchased under the “Cool Carpet” programme, under which an extra purchase amount is used to offset the greenhouse gas emissions that result from the product’s life cycle, from manufacture to disposal.
An unexpected experience
The selection of the colours to be used is a story in itself. The gate lounges on the east side of the pier retain the well-known blue theme in a continuation of the colour scheme characteristic of the airport. The lounges on the west side, on the other hand, are in warm hues, with two separate colour schemes: deep, dark red and dark lavender. According to project manager and architect Inger Quorning, this untraditional choice of colours helps signal design innovation; at the same time, the warm tones create a pleasant atmosphere for the waiting passengers.
“It is something new and different for the airport to work with these warm colour combinations in this way because we’ve traditionally kept to blue hues. Just as a symphony can offer a surprise or an overture, I wanted to offer an unexpected experience for passengers on their way through the long hall of the Pier B building. For this reason, I allowed especially the two large mid-pier lounges to be very different from each other. The new colours really catch the eye, signalling innovation and a change in design. In this way, we will be carrying on the airport’s characteristic expression, while at the same time adding something new,” Quorning explains.
