Why go
The Secret Annex gives physical context to Anne Frank’s wartime diary and the confinement it describes. The canal house on the Prinsengracht, near the Westerkerk, links an ordinary Amsterdam building with the experiences of people hiding from Nazi persecution, making this a distinct visit from the city’s art museums.
The full story
During the Second World War, Anne Frank hid with her family and four other people in rooms at the rear of a seventeenth-century canal house. The hiding place became known as the Secret Annex, or Achterhuis. Its position behind the main building is central to understanding the house and the conditions in which the group lived. Anne did not survive the war. Her diary was published in 1947, bringing her account to readers beyond the people who had known her. The building itself later faced demolition as part of redevelopment plans. The Anne Frank Foundation was established in 1957 to protect it. The museum opened on 3 May 1960. Preserving the hiding place connected the written account with its physical setting. Exhibitions about Anne’s life, persecution and discrimination place that intimate history within wider questions about how people are excluded and threatened.