DIVA

The museum was created in 2018 by combining two existing museums: the Diamond Museum and Silver Museum.

The Diamond Museum was previously located near the Central Station, in the diamond quarter. The museum focused on the history of Diamond trade in the city of Antwerp, from the 16th to the 20th century. In 2012 the complex it was housed in was renovated, and the museum had to close.

The Silver Museum was housed in Sterckshof, a 16th-century castle in the district of Deurne. The museum focused on research and the promotion of the art of metalsmithing. The museum shut its doors in 2014. A selection of its collection was, – until 2017 – on display at a pavilion of the MAS museum.

In 2013 the province of Antwerp purchased the buildings that had housed the Folklore and Ethnographic museums until 2009, when its collection was moved to the new MAS museum. This created space for the collections of the Diamond Museum and Silver Museum which were combined to create a new museum, DIVA, which opened its doors in 2018.

The museum is housed in an elegant building that was originally designed in 1878 by the official city architect Pieter Dens as the last of nine police stations that were built in the city center during the second half of the nineteenth century. Dens created a beautiful Flemish-Renaissance Revival style building with a front facade in red brick accentuated with plenty of white stone ornaments. The top floors of the building were intended as a residence for the city’s chief of police and they look the part.

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In 1979 the building was earmarked as the site of the new Ethnographic Museum and a thorough renovation followed. The museum opened in 1988 and stayed here until 2009. In 2016-2018, another renovation took place to prepare for the opening of the new DIVA museum, and the building was integrated with a nearby complex that was home to the Folk Museum from 1958 until 2007.

The museum’s permanent exhibitions follow a route from mining to finished materials through seven rooms.

It starts on the third floor where you can see an exhibition on Raw Materials. Then on the second floor you can visit the Vault, which focuses on counterfeits. Here you can learn how specialists can tell precious stones from fake ones.

The next room, the Boudoir, showcases stunning diamond-encrusted jewelry from the nineteenth and twentieth century.

The exhibitions continue on the first floor, where you enter a Dining Room full of magnificent silver tableware from the 18th to the early 20th century, a time when silverware on the table was considered a status symbol.

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Next you enter the Trading Room which features a globe that shows why Antwerp, which has been trading diamonds for 550 years, is still called the diamond center of the world. In this room you learn more about the history of the diamond trade throughout the centuries.

The adjacent Atelier takes a closer look at silversmithing and diamond processing, and the creation of the precious items you can see in the museum. You can see all the tools that are used to create jewelry and cut diamonds, including contemporary ones such as lasers and 3D printers.

Finally you arrive in the Room of Wonder, where you can find a selection of rare exotic items from all across the globe as well as antiquities including a selection of reliquaries.

The museum has many fascinating pieces of jewelry and silverware. One of its top pieces is a rare owl cup that was created in Antwerp in 1548-1549. It was created from silver and coconut – at the time a very exotic material – in the shape of an owl. You can find the owl in the Dining Room.

Another remarkable piece is the so-called ‘Golden Racket’, a life-size golden tennis racquet studded with 1617 diamonds that is on display in the Trading Room. It was created in 1986 as a special trophy for the ECC tennis tournament that took place in Antwerp until 1998.

In the Wonder Room you can find a peacock brooch, made in Paris around 1867. It is colorfully decorated with diamond, ruby, sapphire and emerald pearls. Just as colorful and from the same provenance but in a very different style is the Art Deco brooch from around 1925 with coral, malachite, and lapis lazuli flower motifs.

The DIVA museum also owns several items related to Napoleon. One of these is a parure with amethyst gemstones fringed with diamonds. It was created around 1810 and was a gift from Napoleon to countess Vilain XIIII.