Reopening of the ARTIS Aquarium

After five years of extensive restoration, the ARTIS Aquarium reopened its doors. The iconic national monument, dating from 1882, was ready to begin a new chapter—one that deserved an opening that was not only festive, but also allowed visitors to experience what the renewed Aquarium is all about: immersion.

Inspired by the ‘Dive into ARTIS’ campaign (credits: Natwerk), we developed a festive opening day on which everyone wearing swimming goggles received free admission to the park.

At the heart of the experience was the ‘Aquarium Route’: a series of striking blue arches leading visitors from the ARTIS entrance all the way to the renewed Aquarium. The route not only showed the way—for anyone who may have forgotten exactly where the Aquarium was—but also created a symbolic immersion into the underwater world before visitors had even stepped inside.

At the entrance, the morning began with a festive countdown led by ARTIS Director Rembrandt Sutorius and Mayor Femke Halsema—both wearing swimming goggles—from a miniature diving board, officially opening the Aquarium Route.

Accompanied by live music from a DJ and surrounded by a haze of environmentally friendly bubbles, Rembrandt and the Mayor then led the procession along the blue route towards the Aquarium. There, a guard of honour formed by ARTIS employees awaited them. Together, they symbolically opened the doors of the renewed Aquarium.

It marked the festive start of a celebratory day. Alongside free admission, visitors could take part in educational craft activities at the ARTIS Atelier and enjoy a variety of entertainment, including a diver on stilts creating extra-large bubbles.

In this way, the reopening of the ARTIS Aquarium became an inviting and joyful experience for visitors of all ages, bringing the ‘Dive into ARTIS’ campaign to life and preparing the national monument for its next century.