Kunstmuseum Den Haag
Berlage's yellow-brick museum holding the world's largest Mondrian collection, plus fashion and design.
Kunstmuseum Den Haag was the last major commission of the Dutch architect Hendrik Petrus Berlage, who died in 1934 before the building opened in 1935. Built from yellow brick around a sequence of courtyards and ponds, it was among the first Dutch museums designed with indirect daylight and a modular grid of galleries. Berlage treated the museum as a calm sequence of interiors rather than a monumental facade, and the building is now a listed national monument in the Zorgvliet district.
The collection covers modern and contemporary art, fashion, applied art and musical instruments. Its holding of work by Piet Mondrian is the largest anywhere, numbering roughly three hundred pieces and including the unfinished Victory Boogie Woogie. Other strengths include Dutch and international modernism, De Stijl, prints and drawings, and a fashion collection of some 55,000 items. The museum shares its site with the neighbouring photography and science attractions and was known as the Gemeentemuseum until a renaming in 2019.
Highlights
- Victory Boogie Woogie and the world's largest Mondrian holding
- Berlage's 1935 yellow-brick galleries, courtyards and reflecting ponds
- Fashion collection of roughly 55,000 garments and accessories
- Wonder Rooms and a noted collection of historic musical instruments
