12 Jul 2019
Last surviving jekt vessel at centre of new Norwegian shipping museum
BY Andy Knaggs
A new museum that celebrates centuries-old Norwegian shipping practices has been opened in Bodø, north-western Norway.
Created by architects Rintala Eggertsson and exhibition design studio Kvorning Design & Communication, the Norwegian Jekt Trade Museum pays tribute to the jekt: an open freight vessel, characterised by a wide body and sails. The jekt was used for more than 400 years for carrying stock fish and cod-liver oil from the north of Norway, whose coastal communities depended on this trade, down to export cities in the south of the country.
A centrepiece of the entire exhibition is the Anna Karoline, the world's only original "Norlandsjekt", which was built in 1876, and was finally put ashore in the 1950s at the site where the museum now stands.
"Rintala Eggertsson Architects' beautiful and balanced architecture and Kvorning Design's interaction exhibition melt well together," said Arne Kvorning, chief exhibition design and architect at Kvorning. "In many ways, the final exhibition looks like the sketch project we developed many years ago. A Gesamtkunstwerk, I am tempted to say ‒ architecture, exhibition, contents and story."
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