Louwman Museum

Louwman Museum

Front of the museum in 2010
Former name	Nationaal Automobiel Museum
Established	1969
Location	1969-1981: Leidschendam 1981-2010: Raamsdonksveer since 2010: The Hague, Netherlands
Type	Car museum
Website	http://www.louwmanmuseum.nl

The Louwman Museum is a museum for historic cars, coaches, and motorcycles in The Hague, Netherlands. It is situated on the Leidsestraatweg near the A44 highway. The museum's former names are "Nationaal Automobiel Museum" and "Louwman Collection".

The collection of over two hundred cars has been assembled since 1934 by two generations of the Louwman family. The collection was founded in 1934 with the purchase of a 20-year-old Dodge by Dodge importer Pieter Louwman, the father of the current owner. In 1969, the collection of Mr. Geerlig Riemer was added. Riemer was also founder of the Institute for Automotive and Management (IVA) in Driebergen. The building which used to house Riemer's collection has since been used as a practical center for the IVA.

The current owner of the collection is Evert Louwman, the Dutch importer of Lexus, Toyota and Suzuki. In 1969 the collection was moved to Leidschendam to the newly opened National Automobile Museum. In 1981 the museum was moved to a new location on the property of importer Louwman & Parqui in Raamsdonksveer. On 18 April 2003 the name "Louwman Collection" was adopted.

On 3 July 2010 the current museum in The Hague, named Louwman Museum, was opened by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, whose former home Huis ten Bosch is virtually neighboring the museum.

The Louwman Museum is housed in a building with three floors and over 10,000 m² of exhibition space, on The Hague's Leidsestraatweg. It was specifically designed as a museum by Michael Graves, an American architect. Landscape architect Louis Baljon designed the layout of the park surrounding the building. The hall when entering the museum is modern, focusing more on architecture than on the cars.

Evert Louwman is the brother of Jan Louwman, owner of the former Wassenaar Zoo, which closed in 1985. The Zoo used to have a gate with two brick pillars on which two lions stood. This old gate became the entrance to the new museum.