A museum dedicated to the Amsterdam School, the exuberant early 20th-century architectural movement that gave the city some of its most distinctive housing blocks. The museum is housed in Het Schip ("The Ship"), a social housing complex designed by Michel de Klerk in 1919 — a building so elaborately decorated that it scandalized the city council, who thought working-class housing should be plain and functional.
The building is extraordinary: undulating brickwork, expressive towers, hand-crafted details in iron and tile, and a post office with an interior that looks like a fairy-tale set. The museum tour includes a restored working-class apartment, showing how a family of the 1920s lived in two tiny rooms. The surrounding Spaarndammerbuurt neighbourhood is an open-air gallery of Amsterdam School architecture — walk the nearby streets after your visit.