Collection and Research

Centraal Museum manages more than 70,000 objects spanning art, urban history, fashion and design. Through ongoing research, collection care and restoration, we keep the collection in good condition and continue to uncover new stories. Read in-depth articles about our collections here, or find information for professionals about our loan policy and library.

Our Collection for You

Would you like to request a loan, use images, or offer objects to the museum? We’re happy to help. Read below to find out how to submit your request.

Loans for use

Request a loan

Objects

Offering properties

Request image

Order a digital image of a collection object

Library

The Centraal Museum library holds approximately 35,000 titles. They can be consulted by appointment.

More information

Collection Care

Behind the scenes, we take good care of our collection. We document what we know, preserve the objects as carefully as possible, and make the collection accessible now and for the future.

Collection Research

We investigate where the objects in our collection come from and who previously owned them. We do this for new acquisitions, as well as for objects that have been in the collection for some time. This helps us gain the best possible understanding of the history behind each object. We pay particular attention to potentially looted art and objects that involuntarily changed hands around the time of the Second World War. As new information continues to become available, for example through digitised archives, provenance research remains an ongoing and important part of our work.