World Design Embassies @ Van Abbe Museum – Embassy of Inclusive Society (2022)
Type: Exhibition Design
Concept: Setareh Noorani and Jelmer Teunissen
Graphic Design: The Anderen
Client: World Design Embassies / Dutch Design Week
Build: Van Abbe Museum team
Materials: Het Nieuwe Instituut, MVRDV, SCRAPXL, and City Seats.
Selected press coverage:
Curator Tour, Embassy of Inclusive Society
Embassy of Inclusive Society, Dutch Design Week
Miriam van der Lubbe is sinds dit jaar ‘creative head’ van Dutch Design Week, Humberto AVROTROS
In a time of increasing polarization and demographic change, the idea of inclusivity feels more urgent than ever. While widely discussed, it can often feel abstract and complex. For the spatial design of the Embassy of Inclusive Society, a 10-day manifestation at the Van Abbemuseum, we chose to embrace this complexity and the discomfort it can bring. The project asks: how can design facilitate collective action, learning, and unlearning? The goal was to create a coherent, beautifully curated space while giving visitors the complete freedom to interact with, change, and appropriate the environment.
To bridge the project’s big ideas with practical design, we worked with a Curatorial Manual written and edited by Shay Raviv, Setareh Noorani, Jelmer Teunissen, and Karin Fishnaller. This manual acted as a shared manifesto, stating that the embassy should be a place for doing, making, listening, and feeling seen, rather than just a space for passive display. To support this vision, the spatial design follows two main lines: creating order and allowing for a spontaneous overflow of ideas, people, and actions. This organization happened on two scales. Long-range interventions established clear lines of sight and visitor flows, while smaller elements (which we called beestjes or dots) could be grouped together to reshape spaces like the Yellow Room. These elements made welcoming gestures, such as guiding, navigating, and holding, to an otherwise maze-like building.
To keep the information organized, we created a modular system of interventions that scaled in layers and sizes, featuring three variants of announcement boards that came in small, medium, and large. Material sustainability was just as central to the design as social inclusion. Every material used for the exhibition was specifically gathered from waste sources, or bought with the strict intent to be returned or reused afterward. Sourcing happened dynamically: we designed flexible frameworks to fit found materials, and worked with experts to transform them into highly functional spatial elements like large pillows, boards, and flags. The final design provided a welcoming space for community action while ensuring the materials had a life after the exhibition ended.
