The two most potent advertisements of national craftsmanship are the modern World's Fair and the modern superliner. Three years ago the French Line launched the vastly chic Normandie as one of France's supreme artistic achievements and somewhat incidentally as a ship. Cunard White Star's vastly smart Queen Mary is supposed to embody the artistic as well as the ship-building genius of Great Britain. Sailing last week on the first return voyage of Holland-America Line's brand new Nieuw Amsterdam (TIME, May 23), the U. S. travelers for whom she was frankly designed found the art of The Netherlands at its niftiest.
Designers of ship interiors are faced with the fact that decorations which might be diverting on land are often reduced to vulgarity by the Atlantic Ocean. Luckily for the Nieuw Amsterdam, the characteristic tradition of Dutch art. which is that of lucid Jan Vermeer and not that of umbrageous Rembrandt, contains excellent precedent for marine design. The modern architecture of Holland, exemplified in the Euclidean beauties of J. J. P. Oud's houses, contains even more. Making safe concessions to the tourist's desire for a "luxury ship," the Nieuw Amsterdam's, designers managed to keep in the spirit of these traditions.
The work of 15 architects and 50 artists, the Nieuw Amsterdam's, public rooms and cabins impressed U. S. travelers last week with the uniformity of taste lavished on third class, tourist and cabin class alike. Solid, cleanly built furniture, beautiful fabrics, opulent rugs, plenty of light and unobtrusive color harmonies of silver, beige and light yellow were more important to the general effect than the occasional murals and ornamental work in metal, wood and glass. In an apparent effort to make some distinction between tourist and cabin class quarters, the designers gave cabin class passengers a little Coromandel wood and gold. Finest rooms: the theatre, only air-conditioned one afloat, designed by Cornelis J. Engelen and Elisabeth de Boer in the shape of half an egg shell, with a rich color scheme of old rose, cerise, dull gold and red copper; Architect Oud's tourist class lounge, with a magnificent gay scarlet carpet.