The vision of creating a non-denominational Room of Silence in the middle of Berlin came about in the eastern part of the then still divided city in December 1988. After the German reunification in 1990 the idea was transmitted to people in the western part of the city. Soon a small "Action Group" consisting of citizens of Berlin was formed with the aim of creating a Room of Silence in a suitable building in the centre of Berlin near the former frontier between opposing military forces and hostile ideologies. The room was modelled on a similar room which Dag Hammarskjöld had commissioned for himself and his colleagues in 1957 in the United Nations building in New York; this room is still in use. The "Action Group" was transformed into the organisation "Förderkreis Raum der Stille in Berlin e.V." in 1993 under the protectorate of the then President of the Berlin House of Representatives Dr. Hanna-Renate Laurien. Thanks to the help of the Berlin Senate the "Förderkreis" could open the Room of Silence in the Brandenburg Gate on 27 October 1994.