John and Yoko's Bed-In at the Amsterdam Hilton

The John and Yoko bed-in in Amsterdam took place at the Hilton Amsterdam, Apollolaan 138, from 25 to 31 March 1969. Days after marrying in Gibraltar, Lennon and Ono let the press into the presidential suite every day to talk about peace. The hotel now rents that suite as the John and Yoko Suite, Room 702.

A honeymoon turned into a press conference

Lennon and Ono married in Gibraltar on 20 March 1969. They expected the wedding to draw heavy coverage and decided to point that attention at the war in Vietnam. Five days later they checked into the Amsterdam Hilton's presidential suite. From 25 to 31 March, journalists could come in every day between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m.

Many reporters expected something scandalous. What they found was the couple in pyjamas, sitting up in bed under two signs, "Hair Peace" and "Bed Peace", ready to talk. Lennon later said that not being taken seriously was part of the plan, and that humour was something their opponents couldn't handle. After the week in bed they flew to Vienna for a press conference about bagism.

The hotel shows up by name in The Ballad of John and Yoko, the song Lennon wrote about that spring.

902 or 702?

Hilton has used Room 702 in its anniversary publicity, including a 2019 video series named after the room. Other accounts say the suite was numbered 902 in 1969 and got its current number when the hotel was renovated. The hotel was fully refurbished between 1996 and 1998. The most likely explanation is that it's the same suite under a new number, but Hilton hasn't explained the change itself.

The photographers in the room

Amsterdam photographer Nico Koster did a private shoot at Lennon's invitation. His negatives went missing for decades, and he found them again in March 2009. Govert de Roos was 15 and managed to get into the suite with his camera. Fifty years later, on 25 March 2019, Hilton featured him in the third film of its Room 702 series.

The suite today

The Hilton Amsterdam opened on 9 May 1962. It was the first hotel in the Netherlands run by an international chain, and Hugh Aart Maaskant designed the building. The John and Yoko Suite is about 50 square metres and has memorabilia of the couple. You can only see it by booking it. In 2019, the Chicago Tribune put the price at 1,800 to 2,300 US dollars a night.

The room has inspired other artists. In 1992 Marijke van Warmerdam and her gallerist Kees van Gelder staged their own bed-in at the same hotel.

Two months after Amsterdam, Lennon and Ono held a second bed-in at the Queen Elizabeth hotel in Montreal.