Conference location
KIT – amsterdam
Mauritskade 63
1092 AD Amsterdam
The Netherlands
KIT has a large conference auditorium, a beautiful reception area and eight meeting rooms of various sizes. All rooms are equipped with professional audiovisual and IT facilities. Upon entering KIT, you will find yourself in the impressive Marble Hall, a soaring octagonal space that leads to the other meeting rooms in the building. The hall is ideal as a meeting and networking space and provides a beautiful setting for banquets and receptions. Technical support is available on request.
Twelve types of marble
The hall is decorated with twelve types of marble from Tuscany, Italy. The floor, the pillars and the stairs are marble-lined and the balustrades are carved out of marble. The colors of the marble are unusual. The green marble, vert polververa, has become scarce and is only mined and used for restoration purposes.
The floor
The pattern of the floor, clearly visible from the upper balustrade, is laid out as a livre ouvert, or open book. The plates were cut and placed in such a way that the marble veins form a symmetrical pattern.
Names of the founders
The names of the 76 founders of what was then the ‘Colonial Institute’ are inscribed in golden letters in three marble panels to the left of the hall. It was they who contributed funds for the building’s construction. The list contains the names of governing bodies, such as the municipality of Amsterdam and the Department of the Interior and the Colonies, but also that of many companies of that time with interests in colonial Indonesia. All the founders paid a minimum of 25,000 guilders. The Marble Hall also displays two busts of the men who founded the Colonial Institute: J.T. Cremer and H.F.R. Hubrechts.