Madurodam — miniature park
Cqui · CC BY-SA 2.5

Madurodam

  • 2 min read
  • 52.099° N 4.298° E

Interesting facts

  • About four kilometres of miniature railway wind through the park, and its trains cover roughly 15,000 kilometres a year.
  • The miniature city is planted with some 5,000 tiny trees and holds more than 400 scale models.
  • Madurodam inspired Storybook Land, the miniature attraction that opened at Disneyland in 1956.
  • The park covers 3.7 hectares, of which the built miniature city itself takes up about 1.8 hectares.
  • Since 1993 the park has displayed a miniature of the house in Curaçao where George Maduro was born.
  • Each year on 4 May, the Dutch day of remembrance, children hold a commemoration for George Maduro at the park.
  • The original layout of the park was designed by the architect S. J. Bouma.

Why it is worth it

Madurodam is a whole country shrunk to a scale of 1:25. In the Scheveningen district of The Hague, the park gathers miniature versions of the Netherlands' famous buildings and landscapes – landmarks, historic city centres and great works of engineering – and sets them in a single small city with its own trains, ships and tiny inhabitants. Everything is modelled to scale, down to the trees and street furniture, and the little figures change their clothes with the seasons.

Behind the charm lies a moving story. The park is named after George Maduro, a law student from Curaçao who fought the German invasion in 1940 as a young army lieutenant, then joined the resistance, and died in Dachau in 1945; he was posthumously awarded the Military William Order, the country's highest decoration for bravery. The idea came from Bep Boon-van der Starp, who wanted to raise money for a sanatorium for students with tuberculosis and had heard of the model village of Bekonscot in England. Maduro's parents funded the project in memory of their son, and Madurodam opened in 1952. On 2 July that year the teenage Princess Beatrix was installed as its mayor; the net proceeds of the park still go to charity.

The models are made in the park's own workshops, where builders study photographs of each original before shaping and painting its miniature, and because the city stands outdoors, the paintwork is constantly retouched. A large renovation for the park's sixtieth anniversary in 2012 regrouped the exhibits around themes – water as friend and enemy, historic cities, and the Netherlands as an inspiration to the world – with interactive elements that set ships sailing and bridges opening. Madurodam in turn inspired other miniature parks, including Catalunya en Miniatura in Spain.

Getting there

The park is in Scheveningen, The Hague, about 1.6 km from the centre of Scheveningen. Tram 9 runs from The Hague Central Station to the Madurodam stop in about ten minutes. Rotterdam The Hague Airport (RTM) is 18.5 km away by straight line.

Plan your visit

We have no confirmed visit data yet. Once it is confirmed, this block also carries the date it was checked.

Nearby places

On these lists

The Most Beautiful Places in South Holland 7The Most Beautiful Places in the Kingdom of the Netherlands 25The Most Remarkable Miniature Parks 5The Most Curious Places 38

From the encyclopaedia

Madurodam is a miniature park and tourist attraction in the Scheveningen district of The Hague in the Netherlands. It is home to a range of 1:25 scale model replicas of famous Dutch landmarks, historical cities and large developments. The park was opened in 1952 and has since been visited by tens of millions of visitors. The entirety of net proceeds from the park go towards various charities in the Netherlands.

Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

52.09940, 4.29756per Wikidata