Together with her family and four other Jews Anne Frank lived here between July 1942 and August 1944 at the time when the Netherlands was under Nazi occupation. This is where she wrote her famous diary. The museum, located in the city centre of Amsterdam, was opened officially in 1960; annually it now attracts more than a million visitors, most of whom from abroad. The museum offers a range of programmes to school groups in which they focus on Anne Frank’s story and on the relevance of that story for today.

In November  2018, after a period of renovation, the renewed Anne Frank House was opened by King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands. The hiding place has been carefully preserved and especially for the young generation (the average age of the visitors is well below thirty), the new museum more explicitly depicts the connection between the ‘micro’ history of the period in hiding in the Secret Annexe and the ‘macro’ history of the Holocaust in Amsterdam. In the new exhibitions also the roles and motives of the helpers of the people in hiding are highlighted.

The Anne Frank House is also an educational institution. On the basis of Anne Frank’s life story, set against the background of the Holocaust and the Second World War, the Anne Frank House develops a variety of educational activities with the aim of raising people’s awareness of the dangers of anti-Semitism, racism and discrimination and the importance of freedom, equal rights and democracy. Students can participate in many of the Houses’s activities; other materials and seminars focus on professionals, such as teachers, policy makers and police.

Activities of the Anne Frank House take place in more than fifty countries. Travelling exhibitions are at the core of the educational outreach programme. In most countries the educational concept of the Anne Frank exhibition incorporates ‘peer education’: young people themselves are trained to be responsible for the implementation of the educational programme. In recent years the Anne Frank House has established an international Anne Frank Youth Network that enables youngsters in different parts of the world to learn from each other.

More: www.annefrank.org