Museum Het Schip

I spoke to my walking guide and he suggested I go to this museum and figured I would give it a go.

It was a tour of the Amsterdam school movement in a socialist building design and the walk through of how people in 1890 were living in slums of up to 7 people in a small container size building. This happened as the population massively grew as people came to Amsterdam for factory work.

The designer was Michel de Klerk and he included a school, post office and living areas into this building.

Rules were put in place that there had to be 30sqm per family and parents must have a seperate bedroom. There must be windows and water and sewerage.

There was strict rules for being allowed to live here. They had to identify as socialist, not drink alcohol and bathe often. Not allowed to hang washing outside, carpet banging on certain days and the heart of the home being the dinning room was tidy. This was checked each week. They would get stamps to prove they had baithed.

This wasn't what I was expecting to see when he said it was regarding architecture but it was something different and interesting.Read more