The Deutsche Wetterdienst (DWD) is developing a new meteorological workstation based completely on Java technology. The project is a joint effort of DWD, German Military Geophysical Service, MeteoSwiss and Danish Meteorological Institute. The system will support forecast and analysis operations and will have an interactive and batch-controlled chart production component. With respect to the legacy systems to be replaced, new functionality is required, e.g. 3-D visualization, advanced analysis capabilities and improved geography. Demands from the technical side are performance, independence of platform and a well designed, open and scalable system architecture. The design follows an object-oriented approach utilizing formal methods, in particular UML. Primary aim is a 3-tier system (client, server, access layer), a web service will be added later. The architecture of the client uses a scheme that allows the independent development and integration of individual application layers, e.g. for observation data, gridded data or geography, thus giving every participating partner the opportunity to build applications tailored to their needs. Framework components like a layer container provide the necessary services. A self-developped graphics API abstracts from the underlying Java-2d or -3d interfaces. Access to the data, that come from various sources like flat files or a RDBMS, is encapsuled from the core system by adaptor interfaces. For the C/S communication, a Java ORB will be used.