Verzetsmuseum Amsterdam: Museum in Plantage

★★★★★ 4.7

The Verzetsmuseum Amsterdam, the Dutch Resistance Museum, tells the story of the Second World War in the Netherlands and its former colonies through more than 130 personal stories. It sits in the Plancius building on the Plantage Kerklaan, and it shows how ordinary people faced hard choices under occupation. The main exhibition covers daily life, collaboration, the persecution of the Jews and resistance between 1940 and 1945, with objects, testimonies and multimedia. It reopened in renewed form on 1 December 2022. A section added in October 2024 looks at the war in the former colonies and how it strengthened the call for independence, with attention to the Dutch East Indies, Suriname and the Caribbean Netherlands. Verzetsmuseum Junior, opened in 2013, is a separate exhibition for children, following four real children through the war: Eva, Jan, Nelly and Henk. A free audio tour comes with your ticket in eight languages, including Dutch Sign Language. People from the former resistance founded the museum in 1984. It opened on 19 November 1985 in the former synagogue on the Lekstraat and moved here on 29 April 1999. The building itself dates from 1876, when the Jewish choral society Oefening Baart Kunst had it built to a design by Nicolaas Vos, and the Star of David on the facade recalls the Jewish past of this part of the city. It later served as a society and conference hall, and for almost 80 years as a garage. An audio tour is included in the ticket, in several languages and in Dutch Sign Language. Assistance dogs are welcome and a companion gets in free. Tram 14 and metros 51, 53 and 54 stop close by, and the Cultuurferry stops at Entrepotdok, very near the museum.