the Mauritshuis | ARUP

The Mauritshuis is a 17th century city palace in The Hague, exhibiting the very best Dutch paintings of the Golden Age, like 'The Girl with the Pearl Earring' by Johannes Vermeer. The museum needed a large renovation and an extension, which houses a new exhibition space, an auditorium and room for educational purposes. Arup's nearly invisible building services design made it possible to maintain the monumental nature of the building, while keeping the central focus on the art collection. "In order to make the building services invisible, we mapped all possibilities in detail. Even behind the fabric of the wall covering we discovered a space befitting a temperature and humidity sensor. These type of findings were all assimilated into the design. In the Netherlands it is extremely rare for a tender phase to work out the building services concept on this level of detail. " — Bart Kramer-Segers, Project Manager, Arup An underground foyer connects the city palace to the adjacent building of 'Sociëteit de Witte', which was completely stripped and redeveloped as exhibition space.