Our Lord in the Attic

Our Lord in the Attic is one of the most beautiful and interesting museums in Amsterdam. Yet, many of you will never have heard of this museum. It is like a secret only for those ‘in the know’. In the very heart of old Amsterdam and is a ‘must’ for those who would like to take a step back in time to the 1600’s. It was a Catholic church in a Protestant country and is a great example of Dutch religious tolerance. Established in 1663, it is perfectly preserved and intensely interesting. It is the second oldest museum in Amsterdam after the Rijksmuseum and just as fascinating but in a very different way. You just have to see this wonderful museum and the story about its history will remain with you for a very long time.

This museum is right in the heart of old Amsterdam, to be clearer, slap-bang in the heart of the Red Light District. The entrance is smartly modern which is deceiving as you are about to enter a perfectly preserved 17th-century house from the Dutch Golden Age.

The House that hid a secret

You will progress through the house with an excellent audio guide that gives interesting insights into the way people lived at the time. Compared to what had come before, they must have felt that their time was the very height of modernity and comfort.

The bed might seem a bit small for a Dutch person, I hear you say…That is for two reasons: the Dutch it seems grew upwards after the Second World War and I understand that in the 17th Century people used to sleep partially upright as it was assumed that lying fully stretched out was unhealthy. Is that true?

Here are more museums you can visit in Amsterdam.

Just a Stunning home as you progress from room to room. Even the kitchen must have seemed the very latest at that time. Many of the pottery you will see was saved and restored.

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The kitchen, the bedrooms, the living areas are all beautifully preserved. This feels like a trip back in time. You can imagine the boat arriving and leaving from and to the four corners of the globe. You can imagine the noise outside and locals hauling goods into the buildings in the area. And the laughter and shouts of a bustling city.

The Chuch in Our Lord in the Attic

As you move through the house, you can imagine how they lived. You can get a real feel for the period. And then you take a set of stairs and you see one of the most wondrous and unexpected things you will see in your life: a beautiful church in the attic. It really is something that will surprise and delight you. A church that dates from 1663 when it was illegal to celebrate such a mass. The famous Dutch tolerance meant that people did celebrate their religion here. You can imagine the scenes of the time. This is a piece of history that you absolutely has to see for yourself.