Nieuwe Kerk

A church for kings and exhibitions

The Nieuwe Kerk stands on Dam Square, right beside the Royal Palace. A narrow street, the Mozes en Aäronstraat, runs between them. Since 1814 this has been the church where Dutch monarchs are sworn in. Today nobody holds services here. It is run as a cultural centre, with changing exhibitions, often on history and other cultures. The big Suriname show in 2019 was one of them. There are organ concerts too.

It is worth the walk because it is both things at once: a working stage for the nation and a 600-year-old building that has burned and been rebuilt.

Old church, new church

Amsterdam grew so fast in the later 1300s that its first parish church, now called the Oude Kerk, became too small. In 1408 the Bishop of Utrecht gave permission for a second one, hence the name. Building had started around 1380 on land given by Willem Eggert, who paid for the church. It was consecrated in 1409. You can compare it with the Oude Kerk in the Red Light District, a ten-minute walk away.

The church was spared in the Iconoclasm of 1566. After the Alteratie of 1578, when it became Protestant, much of its Catholic interior was destroyed anyway.

Then came 11 January 1645. Plumbers working under the roof set it alight on a cold, clear day with a strong north-east wind. Within half an hour the whole church was burning. By three in the afternoon the roof had come down. The brass chandeliers were pulled out of the rubble unharmed. The church was rebuilt in Gothic style and reopened on 10 May 1648. Most of what you see inside dates from after the fire.

The tower that never was

Look at the west front and you will notice there is no tower. Foundations were laid in 1565, but the plans died with the changing politics of the time. In 1646 a second attempt began, with a design meant to rise higher than the Domtoren in Utrecht. In 1647 the last of 6,363 piles went into the ground. A gold offering worth 200 guilders was buried for luck. Six years later the city stopped the work. The new town hall next door, now the palace, was costing more than 8 million guilders. The unfinished stump was mostly pulled down in 1783. Only the base remains. If you want a church tower in Amsterdam, the one at the Westerkerk is the one that got built.

What to look for inside

Start at the east end, where the high altar once stood. Here is the tomb of Admiral Michiel de Ruyter, by Rombout Verhulst, from 1681. Nearby is the monument to another admiral, Jan van Galen, from 1656.

Then look up at the great organ of 1655. Its case was made by Jacob van Campen. When Willem-Alexander and Máxima came in for the blessing of their marriage in 2002, the organ shutters were opened as if to embrace them. The pictures went round the world. The carved pulpit, finished in 1664, is by Albert Vinckenbrinck.

The stained glass tells the royal story. The Coronation Window in the south transept dates from 1898, the year Wilhelmina was inaugurated. That day was filmed, and the footage is the oldest film made in Amsterdam, and in the Netherlands. Along the aisles are the Liberation Window by Toon Verhoef from 1995 and Marc Mulders' 'Een tuin van glas' from 2005.

Finally, find the memorials to the poets Vondel and Hooft and the historian Johan Huizinga. Around ten thousand people were once buried here. Nearly all the graves were cleared in the restoration of 1959 to 1980. Every year on 4 May the national remembrance ceremony takes place in this church, before the wreath-laying at the monument outside on the Dam.