Colombo Dutch Museum

The Colombo Dutch Museum was constructed during the Dutch occupation of Colombo from 1692 to 1697. It was during this period that the place acted as the official residence of the Dutch governor Thomas van Rhee. The building was later used as a teacher training college and as an institution for instructing the clergymen and priests between 1696 and 1796.

Further, there are some shreds of evidence which prove that the Colombo Dutch Museum was used as an orphanage under the supervision of Dutch East Indies Company VOC. The building later began to be used as a hospital and became a barracks somewhere around the second half of the 1800s.

In the era of the 1900s, it was used as a police training school which was set up and established by the British, to later becoming the Pettah post office in 1932. The year 1971, received heavy monsoons which led to the collapse of one of the exterior walls and the building was abandoned. This created a series of protests which was led by the Royal Asiatic Society and the Dutch Burgher Union which put pressure to restore the Colombo Dutch Museum.

Thus began the process of restoring the Dutch museum which commenced in 1977 and was completed by 1981, finally opening the museum to the public in the year 1982.

The Colombo Dutch Museum is easily accessible from any part of Colombo. One can hire a private cab or a three-wheeler (tuk-tuk) to reach the destination.