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The largest open-air museum in the Netherlands

Arnhem, the capital of the Dutch province of Gelderland, is home to an extraordinary open-air museum that invites visitors to travel back in time to the Netherlands of centuries past. The museum park consists of 80 historic buildings, farms, craft workshops, corner shops, and windmills that bring the history of the Netherlands to life. The interactive museum opened in 1918 with six buildings. During World War II, the buildings were used to house resistance fighters and evacuees, and unfortunately some of them were destroyed. After facing closure in 1987 due to declining visitor numbers, the open-air museum underwent continuous redevelopment and even acquired an old tram in 1996. This effort paid off, because in 2005 the Dutch Open Air Museum was voted European Museum of the Year. The largest open-air museum in the Netherlands is located in a wooded area where you can explore six themed areas – farms, villages, country life, gardens, ribbon development, and country estates – on foot or by tram. There are animals to discover on the farms, while the village has been designed around a lake with a drawbridge, windmills, and a shipyard. The Dutch Open Air Museum gave me a wonderful insight into life and everyday life in the Netherlands over the last 350 years.

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