Rijksmuseum Twenthe

Jan Bernard van Heek's family made their money in the Twente textile industry, which dominated Enschede for a century, and he gave his collection of some eighty works, from the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century, to the state with a purpose-built museum, opened in 1930 in a brick building by Muller and Beudt around a courtyard. It is one of the few Dutch national museums outside the Randstad. The collection runs wide: medieval and early Netherlandish panels, seventeenth-century Dutch painting including Jacob van Ruisdael and Salomon van Ruysdael, later and modern art, and a contemporary programme with commissioned installations that sit deliberately awkwardly among the old masters.

What's there

• A national museum outside the Randstad - built in 1930 from a textile fortune.
• Medieval panels to modern art - a wide collection across five centuries.
• Commissioned contemporary work - installations set among the old masters.
• A courtyard building of 1930 - purpose-built for the collection.

When to go

All year. Half a day.

What to expect

Closed Mondays. The collection rotates and the contemporary interventions are not to everyone's taste. Enschede is a long way from the Randstad and largely postwar. Temporary shows take space.

Nearby

Lutterzand and the Dinkel are north; the German border is east.

Key facts