The major works
Cats by Picasso, Rembrandt and Steinlen.
Rudolphous — CC BY-SA 3.0 · PersianDutchNetwork — Public domain · Jacob Olie — Public domain · Andy Li — CC0
The KattenKabinet is a museum in a canal house on the Herengracht devoted to a single subject: the cat in art. Paintings, sculpture, posters, stamps and books, from works by Picasso, Rembrandt and Steinlen to twentieth-century advertising. Its origin is entirely personal. A Dutch businessman founded it in 1990 in memory of his cat John Pierpont Morgan, who had lived with him for seventeen years and whom he had named after the American banker as a joke. The collection grew from there into one of the largest in the world on this narrow subject. The unexpected part is that the museum is inhabited: several real cats live in the house and wander among the visitors, sleeping on the chairs and tables, and they are a declared part of the experience. The house itself is seventeenth century, on the Golden Bend, with its original rooms — so even anyone indifferent to cats sees a canal house from the inside.
Cats by Picasso, Rembrandt and Steinlen.
Original seventeenth-century rooms.
Herengracht 497, 1017 Amsterdam
The Golden BendThe Golden Bend is the stretch of the Herengracht between Vijzelstraat and Leids1 minute walk4.8
The MunttorenA tower in two halves from two centuries: the Munttoren was part of the Regulier2 minutes walk4.4
Foam Photography MuseumFoam is a museum devoted to photography alone, occupying a canal house on the Ke3 minutes walk4.3
Museum Van LoonMuseum Van Loon is the classic Amsterdam canal house opened to visitors: an eleg3 minutes walk4.3
Het LieverdjeA small bronze statue of a boy standing on Spui square, erected in 1960, its nam5 minutes walk4.5It depends what you are paying for. If you want a serious art museum, no — the collection is thematic rather than historical. But the ticket also buys entry to a seventeenth-century canal house with its rooms, stairs and garden, which is what you pay comparable money for at any other canal house museum. Treat it as a canal house with an odd collection rather than an art museum in a handsome building, and on that measure it is fair.