Decoration

The Firm Help (Firmaet Hjælp) was established by two couples, Poul and Aase Gernes and Knud and Birgit Pontoppidan, to resocialize rehabilitating drug addicts through hard physical labour. The Firm Help had a contract with Copenhagen Municipality about renovation of holiday camps. One of its first jobs was Havreholm. The two couples, the two youngest children of the Gernes family and four newly clean addicts lived and worked in the holiday camp for four months. The project was based on a collective lifestyle. The slept together in a dormitory, shared meals and took turns reading aloud to each other in the evenings. After Havreholm, they moved on to another holiday camp by Stillinge Strand. 

Also part of the picture were the facts that Poul Gernes was simultaneously working on the decoration of Herlev Hospital and the exhibition Der er dejligt i Danmark in Copenhagen, while Knud Pontoppidan was boosting his start-up specialized in space research. The Firm Help existed for approximately a year. Havreholm is one of the earliest Gernes decorations. The colour scheme seems fresh and vigorous when weighed against the colours at Herlev Hospital. Even more so when weighed against the late-period more refined colour schemes.