Hollandsche Schouwburg

Hollandsche Schouwburg stands in Amsterdam as a former theatre whose façade, courtyard monument, and mourning room preserve a difficult history. The theatre opened on 5 May 1892.

Designed by architect Cornelis Antonius Bombach, the building first hosted Dutch performances before Nazi occupiers designated it a Jewish theatre in 1941. Jewish actors performed there, and Jewish audiences attended orchestras, theatre productions, and wedding ceremonies. From July 1942, the building became a deportation centre where tens of thousands of Jews awaited transport to Westerbork, Vught, and other camps. Across the street, resistance groups helped smuggle around 600 Jewish children from a nursery holding them apart from their parents.

The memorial includes an exhibition, an everlasting lamp, and a wall engraved with approximately 6,700 surnames. Computers connect visitors with the Jewish Monument, which documents more than 104,000 people persecuted as Jews in the Netherlands who did not survive the Holocaust. The wheelchair-accessible site forms part of Amsterdam’s Jewish Cultural Quarter.