The collections

The collections of the Museum Plantin-Moretus are extremely diverse. They are all closely connected to the business operations and family life of Christoffel Plantin and his successors, the Moretus family. Discover a large part of these unique collections in the online catalogues: printing plates, presses, casting moulds, type cases, stamps and matrices, furniture, prints and drawings, paintings, and much more.

©Filip Dujardin

Explore the collections

The Historical House

A warm home, a business empire, a remarkable feat of architecture, or a livable art gallery: the house Plantin purchased in 1576 was all of these. And, remarkably, it still is. Surrounded by original paintings, furniture, and interior elements, everything seems just as it was back then.

Old Books

40,000 historical books, 69,000 single-sheet prints, 650 manuscripts, and 15,000 titles of early modern specialist literature, it would be easy to lose track. But no worries: thanks to our staff and carefully structured cataloguing, you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for.

Printing Materials

Lead type, composing sticks, punches and matrices: nowhere in the world will you find a collection of printing materials as valuable as that of the Museum Plantin-Moretus.

Archives

In addition to its UNESCO-protected business archives, Plantin-Moretus also houses several research archives and its own museum archive. Together, they form a treasure trove of information about how the family lived here and how, together with their workers, they produced and published books.

Prints and Drawings

The Plantin printing house needed designs to illustrate books. Over the centuries, the drawings literally piled up. Today, the Print Room has more than 80,000 prints and drawings: a blueprint of five centuries of graphic art in Antwerp.

Highlights of the collection

Discover the collection

The world's two oldest printing presses

Hendrik van den Keere (1540-1580), Grande musicque

Rosewood curio cabinet