The ambition to build a new attraction dedicated to Vincent Van Gogh in the Netherlands will soon become a reality! The Van Gogh Homeland Experience is currently being devised, which is great news for Van Gogh admirers and those looking to discover something different as they explore the Dutch countryside.
The proposed attraction brings visitors into contact with art and nature simultaneously, with seven tall towers acting as vantage points so viewers can admire the Dutch landscape that inspired Vincent Van Gogh in his paintings.
Diverting tourism away from Amsterdam
The Van Gogh Homeland Experience is good news for Dutch tourism, as efforts have been made to divert tourists away from Amsterdam city centre and into other Dutch cities and provinces. According to Joost Melis, the driving force behind the project, the Van Gogh Homeland Experience will take some pressure off Amsterdam tourism, which has become saturated with visitors over the years.
The Van Gogh Museum is one of the most widely visited tourist attractions each year in the Netherlands, and in future, fans of Van Gogh will not be missing out by avoiding the capital and visiting other parts of the Netherlands.
Van Gogh - a Brabant-born icon
The Van Gogh Homeland Experience will cost around 8 million euros to build. The idea was brewing for many years to create a third major public attraction in Brabant. Two years ago, ideas came to fruition to make plans for an attraction on the theme of Van Gogh as an icon of Brabant, to act as the third in a trio of popular Brabant parks along with the amusement park Efteling and the animal park Beekse Bergen.
This led to the formation of the Van Gogh Homeland Experience foundation, with the park towers as its flagship project. “Our ambitions are very high. We put the province on the map internationally ”, says Joost Melis, who hopes that the new attraction will garner 400.000 visitors a year and put them in the same list of popular Dutch attractions, alongside Efteling and Beekse Bergen.
Majestic towers overlooking the Dutch countryside
The application by the foundation for a new national park, to be named Van Gogh National Park, is pending. It will connect existing nature reserves in North Brabant, roughly between the cities of Den Bosch, Tilburg, Breda, Helmond and Eindhoven. Seven towers, reaching between 20 and 60 metres in height, will be placed throughout the park. From these high towers, visitors will be able to admire the view, overlooking landscapes that inspired Van Gogh in his famous artworks.
The towers will have a beacon-like appearance, decorated in colours that correspond to different paintings by Van Gogh. There will be catering services implemented in the towers, serving Dutch food, focusing on regional specialities from Brabant.
The foundation behind the plan will also undertake outreach activities with schools, museums, local businesses and cultural institutions, like Vincent van Gogh House in Zundert, the Van Gogh Church in Etten-Leur and the North Brabant Museum in Den Bosch.