On Saturday, September 22, Her Majesty the Queen will open the new Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, and on September 23 the museum will re-open its doors to the public. After a long hiatus, the contemporary art museum is finally ready to welcome the public to visit its newly renovated and expanded facilities.

Designed by Mels Crouwel (Benthem Crouwel Architects), the building will provide new space for Stedelijk’s renowned and influential temporary exhibitions as well as host new amenities. In hopes of restoring the museum's main character as a meeting place, the shop and the restaurant will be accessible to the public without paying an entrance fee, and the restaurant will remain open at night.

Crouwel designed the building to face the Museumplein, adding a prominent landmark to the public space that the Stedelijk Museum shares with its neighbouring museums. The interior includes a circulation system that allows visitors to enjoy exhibitions on different floors without interruption, by carrying them on an enclosed escalator that runs directly between the first and second floor.


Photo by: Ernst van Deursen. Facade as seen from the Museumplein.

Photo by: John Lewis Marshall. Stedelijk Museum new entrance hall.

Photo by: John Lewis Marshall. Lower-level gallery (10.800 square feet) in the new building designed by Benthem Crouwel Architects.

Photo by: John Lewis Marshall. Stedelijk Museum facade: view of the original building (A.W. Weissman, 1895) and new building designed by Benthem Crouwel Architects.

Photo by: John Lewis Marshall. View of the original building (A.W. Weissman, 1895) and new building designed by Benthem Crouwel Architects.

The permanent collection
The Stedelijk Museum will dedicate half of the ground floor in the historical building to an installation of visual arts from the 1870s to the 1960s, spread throughout a dozen galleries. The installation presents distinct groups of works segmented by subject matter (landscape / cityscape), art movement (expressionism), time period (circa 1913), and other themes.

The other half of the ground floor will highlight installations of industrial design, graphic design and applied arts, while the second floor of the historic building will showcase changing displays from the Stedelijk’s renowned collections of major works from the 1960s until the present, including signature works by the likes of Henri Matisse, Ed Kienholz, and Andy Warhol, as well as monographic rooms filled with artworks by Rineke Dijkstra, Marlene Dumas and Barnett Newman, among others.