Rijksmuseum

The Rijksmuseum traces its origin to 19 November 1798, when the Batavian Republic established a national art gallery inspired by the Louvre; it opened to the public on 31 May 1800 in The Hague before Louis Napoleon Bonaparte moved the collection to Amsterdam's Royal Palace in 1808, uniting it with treasures such as Rembrandt's Night Watch. After further moves, the museum found its permanent home when architect Pierre Cuypers's grand Gothic-and-Renaissance-revival building opened in 1885, a structure so laden with national symbolism that it became an icon of Amsterdam in its own right. A decade-long, €375 million renovation led by Spanish architects Cruz y Ortiz closed most of the museum from 2003 to 2013, restoring Cuypers's original interiors, reopening the courtyards, and creating today's chronological walk through Dutch art and history from 1200 to 2000, including the celebrated Gallery of Honour. As the Netherlands' national museum, it holds the world's foremost collection of Dutch Golden Age painting alongside decorative arts, history, and Asian art. It remains the most-visited museum in the Netherlands and one of the most-visited art museums in the world, and continues to expand public access through its Rijksstudio open-data platform.