Mercator Museum

Museum devoted to Gerard Mercator's revolutionary maps and globes

Address Zamanstraat 49, Sint-Niklaas
Admission €6 adult; free on first Sunday of the month
Opening Hours Tue–Fri 10:00–17:00, Sat–Sun 14:00–17:30; closed Mon

The Mercator Museum holds the largest collection of globes and maps in Belgium, gathered around the legacy of Gerard Mercator (1512–1594), the Flemish cartographer who revolutionised navigation with his 1569 world map projection. The museum's collection includes original Mercator globes, 16th and 17th-century maps, and instruments used in early cartography and navigation.

Mercator spent most of his working life in the Waasland region, and the museum provides strong biographical context alongside the technical displays. The building itself — a renovated 19th-century convent — is handsome. Even without specialist interest in cartography, the globes and illustrated maps are beautiful objects.

things to do museum
A story
Gerard Mercator was born in 1512 in Rupelmonde, just a few kilometres from Sint-Niklaas, and worked in the Waasland region for most of his career. His 1569 world map introduced the cylindrical projection that still bears his name — a projection that rendered straight compass courses as straight lines on paper, transforming navigation. The catch, which Mercator himself acknowledged, is that the projection distorts size: Greenland appears as large as Africa on a Mercator map.