The redevelopment project was sponsored by the Spaniards Cruz y Ortiz, the exhibition was designed by Jean-Michel Wilmotte, and the restoration was carried out by Van Hoogevest Architecten. The task of the architects was to adapt the bulky building in the mainstream of eclecticism, built in 1885 by Petrus (Pierre) Kuypers, for the needs of the museum of the 21st century. Lush interiors distracted attention from the exhibits, there was not enough space for both exhibitions and the accompanying program, it was impossible to arrange the permanent exhibition according to a single system, and so on.
Now all the exhibits from the 12th to the 20th century are arranged in a strict chronological order, by floors from bottom to top, and the chronology is supported by a color scheme: the paint on the walls gradually brightens as it moves upward, reaching almost white in the halls of modern art. At the same time, all the works were arranged in a new way, with the exception of the most important - "Night Watch" by Rembrandt, which returned to its former place in the "Gallery of Honor", where the works of the Golden Age of Dutch art are exhibited.
The architects, according to the already established scheme in museum construction, blocked two courtyards of the building with glass roofs, and also deepened them to the level of the -1 floor, having previously removed the later extensions that occupied them. Then they placed an auditorium under one courtyard, and a museum shop and a cafe under the other. The courtyards themselves have turned into spacious public spaces that can be accessed even without buying a ticket. Their walls form the courtyard facades of the museum, and the new surfaces are faced with light-colored stone. Antonio Cruz and Antonio Ortiz took into account the mistake of Norman Foster, in whose courtyard of the British Museum any sound is clearly audible and even echoes, so in the Rijksmuseum, noises are muffled by white gratings with sound-absorbing material suspended from the ceilings.
But the main problem for the architects was the unification of the two courtyards into a single whole. The historic building has a pedestrian and cyclist corridor in the center of the façade, allowing quick passage through the building. The reconstruction project envisaged turning it into the main entrance to the museum, uniting both courtyards, but the townspeople rebelled, and now the corridor is preserved in its original form, the museum can be accessed through four small entrances, and an underground passage was laid under it, connecting the courtyards with each other.
The museum was closed for reconstruction in 2003 and was going to open already in 2008. The 10-year period of work is explained by the fact that titanic efforts had to be made to build underground levels in the water-filled soil of Amsterdam, and there was no contractor for such a complex project. Arcadis engineers made the new underground parts of the building structurally independent from the historical building, as it slowly subsides. Therefore, the ground corridor and the "Gallery of Honor" located above the underground passage between the courtyards have now been turned into a "bridge" hanging over it. The dug pits were immediately filled with water, so they were poured with special concrete for underwater work, and the process was controlled by divers.
The budget of the project was 375 million euros, but it also includes the construction of a separate pavilion of Asian art, placed in the center of the pond, the adaptation of the park to a sculpture garden by the Copijn Landschapsarchitecten project (14,500 m2), the construction of a service entrance building, the reconstruction of the historical School of Drawing (Teekenschool) as a museum educational center, as well as the construction of a museum workshops building near the Rijksmuseum, merged with another Kuypers building - the former Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
But the renovation of the museum has not yet been completed: it remained open for the duration of the reconstruction
the Philips wing will now be converted into a modern temporary exhibition space. The authors of the project are also Cruz y Ortiz.
